Lovers of Legend II: Curse of Cleopatra's Needle
by katia1
Summary: SORRY ABOUT THE LACK OF UPDATES. I AM CURRENTLY BLOCKED IN THIS FANDOM! Will post again ASAP! After a fallout with Sydney, Nigel returns to London. There he makes a great discovery about a longlost relic that draws both of them into a dangerous hunt...
1. From Bad to Worse

**Disclaimers: I don't own the characters from Relic Hunter and make no money from my fiction writing - please do no reproduce without my permission.**

**NB – this, as is obvious from the title, is the sequel to my first Relic Hunter fanfic, 'Lovers of Legend'. It should make sense without reading the first one, but it might help to do so. There's a revised/improved edition of the first one going up on the 'Going Hunting' website - see my profile for URL. This is also the story I am writing for this years Nanowrimo - the challenge to write a 50,000 word novel in a single month. I am posting a slightly edited version! **

**Dedication: for Ivoryrose, Aryea and Tanya Reed. Thanks :)**

**Lovers of Legend II: The Curse of Cleopatra's Needle**

by Katy

**CHAPTER ONE: FROM BAD TO WORSE.**

Nigel Bailey took a large gulp of piping hot coffee and decided he couldn't believe his bad luck. He'd done everything possible to avoid this occurrence since he'd been back in London. But it had happened, all the same.

Preston had found him.

To make matters worse, he had been scuppered in one of the few places he'd though he'd be safe. Nigel had found for himself a particularly cosy corner towards the back of the manuscripts room of the British Library. It was concealed behind an enormous oak book-cabinet, so old and ornate that it had surely come from the library of George III himself.

There was another good reason, besides avoiding Preston, that Nigel had chosen this particularly corner. He had, that morning, committed the first cardinal sin of any research student by entering the sacred vestibule of the library with his mobile phone on! It was on 'silent vibrate' rather than 'ring-tone' – still bad, but just about forgivable. But there was no way he was going to cut himself off from the world at just the time when the east coast of the U.S.A was waking up. He was waiting for a phone-call from Sydney, and the answer to a message he'd left for her late last night, after he'd made a stunning research breakthrough. He was sure he'd found the clue they needed to begin what could be their more exciting hunt ever – the hunt for the legendary and long-believed lost _real_ Cleopatra's Needle!

But that was _not_ why he was so desperate to hear from Sydney. This was the call that would make him feel better; the call that would reassure him that everything was alright between them. He needed that, particularly after he'd left Trinity in such a hurry and with such cold, bitter words.

But the call had not yet come and Nigel, increasingly despondent, had not moved for hours. Indeed, he had been drowning his sorrows in the hundred-year-old papers of Boris Dostoyevsky, the Russian Egyptologist – or 'Grave Robber', as the less forgiving revisionists would have it. And then Preston, with his big, beaky nose – a feature that Nigel had despised from an early age – had sniffed him out. Nigel had nearly ripped a Papyrus from the 5th century B.C. clean in two when his elder brother mooched around the corner.

Of course, it did no good staying there after that. Preston, with his usual air of patronizing joviality – had started demanding 'what was he doing there', 'why hadn't he told him he was in town' and, of course, 'where was Sydney?' The elder brother articulated it all in such a loud, stagy whisper that the whole room of scholars, family historians and flu-ridden students had began rustling their papers, coughing and generally peeping and grumbling in the direction of the large wooden bookcase.

Nigel had had no choice but to leave, blushing deep scarlet beneath an embarrassed smile. He soon found himself ordering two cappuccinos and a pair of burnt and slightly oily tasting chocolate chip cookies from the Library coffee bar.

Things were going from bad to worse. The too-hot coffee had already scorched his tongue - and the tight bastard hadn't even offered to pay the exorbitant bill! Most horrifically of all, the idiot was now talking: spewing forth a superficially amiable yet disquietingly probing stream of inquiries.

'What on earth are you doing here Podge? I mean, this is ridiculous. I thought you were supposed to work in the glamourous old US of A, but you can't seem to stay away! I read in the newspapers that you and the lovely Professor Fox foiled some pan-European art-and-antiques dealing racket six months ago, and you never even told me you were over! You _do_ have a home here, Nigel. You could at least drop in…where are you staying now? And where is _she_? Don't tell me you're actually alone this time? She hasn't fired you, has she? Come on, Nige…do tell!'

Nigel glowered wearily at his brother, and then stared desperately down at his neat black mobile-phone. Switching on the ring-tone to its loudest setting, he had laid it deliberately on the table in front of him.

'Now would be a really good time to call, Syd,' he thought. But this time Professor Fox did not come to his rescue. The phone remained incriminatingly inanimate and silent.

Nigel took a deep breath: 'If you must know Preston, yes, I'm in London alone, and I didn't call because I thought…well, I thought you'd be busy.'

Preston's blue eyes widened with mock concern. 'I'm never too busy to know how you're getting on. Last time you were in London, you got kidnapped, beaten up – heaven knows what! And I had to read about it in the newspaper after the event. Really, Nigel – I would have thought you'd have a _little_ more time for you older brother.'

Nigel just gawped at him for a second. Preston was attired in a dapper three-piece suit, in a becomingly tweedy shade of light brown. As so often, he made Nigel feel kind of small and scruffy, second rate even, dressed as he was in some smart-ish grey slacks and a thick, blue woolly jumper. And now the bastard had the gall to suggest that _he_, Nigel, was neglecting his brotherly duties.

Nigel could feel his nerves buzzing, his stomach tightening – but he took another deep breath, and did his best to smother the burgeoning flames. He didn't have time to reopen old wounds right now – besides, he'd long decided that talking to Preston would never be the way to heal them.

'I replied to you emails,' he muttered.

'Yes – and with such lengthy eloquence!'

Preston laughed and Nigel, more through gratitude, laughed too. Maybe this wasn't going to be the worst sort of grilling. They could finish their coffee, shake hands, and get out of there…

'So where is Sydney? On a hunt without you? I got the impression she didn't let you out of her sight.'

'No such luck', thought Nigel – and he realized he wasn't going to escape without at least spilling a _few_ of those troublesome beans.

'Sydney's back at Trinity University, I think. She could have gone on a hunt, I know she went on one the week-before-last. I'm expecting a call.'

'She hasn't…she didn't…?'

'No Preston! She didn't fire me! I just, well…I got sick and tired of never having time to finish my research! I'd been her TA for nearly four years and I _still_ hadn't finished my doctorate. I've been entitled to three months study leave to finish my thesis ever since I got there…and so I took it. Is that a sufficient answer?'

Preston narrowed his eyes suspiciously – and Nigel immediately knew he was rumbled. 'No, it's not sufficient,' he chortled. 'You just said you'd been entitled to study-leave for four years. Why take it now?'

'Um...well…'

'Haha! _Um_? Now we're getting somewhere! You two have had a ding-dong, haven't you? A little lover's tiff!'

Nigel felt the blood rush to his cheeks and cursing his body for betraying him even further. Preston's smug little smile made him feel nauseous. How did he know? How _did_ he know???

'We're not lovers,' muttered Nigel. 'I thought that was blatantly obvious.'

Preston shrugged. 'Maybe. But you've been in love with her for ages, haven't you? What happened? Did you finally get into her knickers and think you'd found eternal bliss only to discover you were just another notch on her bedpost?'

That was enough! Nigel wasn't staying here a moment longer. He jumped to his feet, scarcely caring when the chair flew back with a clang, attracting the attention of practically everyone else in the coffee bar.

'I'm not sitting here and listening to you abusing my…my employer and a woman I respect very much as a friend.'

Nigel winced at his own words. How trite and pathetic they sounded – and how typical of bloody Preston, usually as emotionally blind as a Combine Harvester, to be so damned perceptive about the one relationship in his life whose recent floundering had cut him to the quick.

'Sorry,' protested Preston. 'But, look Podge, maybe this is for the best. You do need to get that bloody PhD under your belt before you turn 30. It was starting to be a bit embarrassing when people asked after you: 'What's Nigel doing? _Still_ a Masters student?' You know, everyone expected so much of you and I reckon Mum and Dad would be very proud you've finally got your act together after all that faffing around chasing relics…hold on, Nigel. Where are you going?'

Nigel didn't quite know where he was going. All he knew was that he had to get the hell out of there. It had out started as a cold day, but now he felt oppressively hot. His shirt was sticking to his back under the overly-thick jumper, and his hair was starting to cling uncomfortably to the back of his neck.

He threw off the jumper as he burst out of the heavy swinging doors of the front of the library, then angrily ruffled his hair and tugged at his shirt collar. The hum of voices from the library forecourt behind him was instantly overshadowed by the incessant roar of traffic from the Euston Road.

'How does Preston see through me so quickly?' he wondered angrily as he stomped past a modern arty sculpture of a big metal man with a mathematical compass and towards the tall, brick entrance-gate. The metal letters above it proudly shouted the grandiose location: 'The British Library, The British Library, The British Library!'

The British Library. This place had memories for Nigel, some bad, some good. His Dad had always done his research in the old, circular bookroom in the British Museum, which was beautiful and full of the ghosts of the great and good. Mr. Bailey had liked to sit, for various convoluted reasons, on the very desk where Karl Marx sat: desk 372.

Yet the old bookroom had been small with woefully inadequate for the demands of modern users, and his father, unlike the more conservative readers, had been excited about the new building when the plans were finalised in the late 1980's, and had watched its progress with pleasure. He also had shared with Nigel his hope that one-day somebody would also restore the crumbling gothic towers of St. Pancras station hotel, which loomed over the ever-busy building-site next door. This tottering Victorian pile also excited and fascinated his ever-curious younger son.

Now, of course, the restoration of St. Pancras station was nearly complete, and the new library had been open for nearly a decade. But his father had never entered the plush, well appointed reading-room he had so long dreamed of, or seen King George's library relocated into its controversial, glistening, and six-storey high glass prison. He had been killed before any of it had opened to the public.

Nigel swallowed the lump in this throat before it stimulated any tears. He still felt screwed up that the only family member left to seek him out in the new library was Preston. It was so bloody unfair!

Nevertheless, as Nigel swerved out of the gate and onto the Euston Road, his deep breaths drawing in the stifling fumes of the traffic, he couldn't keep his mind even on these injustices for long. The street reminded him of the one person it really hurt to think about right then: Sydney.

He pictured her, not so long ago, her furious strides slicing through the pouring rain on this very pavement. She'd been so angry with that con-man Bellimo she'd brandished her umbrella as if it had been a lethal weapon.

Everything had been so simple between them, before he'd gone and make an idiot of himself, declaring his undying love in the style of Admiral Lord Nelson to Lady Hamilton. What a pratt!

Of course Sydney had humoured him…hell, she'd slept with him! But once they got back to the States and onto the next hunt, the truth had all become quite clear to Nigel.

He was just another assistant she'd had sex with – and then she'd moved on to the very next, overdeveloped Adonis who'd dropped her a line.

At this reminiscence, Nigel gave himself a metaphorical slap. 'That's not quite how it happened,' he re-assured himself. 'You're doing Sydney a slight injustice…'

Slowing his pace a little, Nigel found himself wandering off the main thoroughfare, and up the side-turning before Euston Station.

'Things can be salvaged between us,' he thought. 'I just need to… return things to how they were before. We can at least _try_ and forget it ever happened! And she's going to be so pleased about that breakthrough I've made with Dostoyevsky's notes, she'll be over here for the hunt in no time. After that phone-call, everything will be alright….'

'Aaaargh!' Nigel couldn't repress his cry of anguish. He slapped every pocket in his trousers with dying hope.

He had left the phone in the British library – with sodding Preston!!!

'Bugger, bugger, bugger!'

Nigel did an about-turn, and was accelerating back up the side-road when the midnight-blue Mercedes drew up beside him.

Alarm-bells rang instantly. Big, dark, menacing looking cars always meant trouble – and the side-street suddenly seemed preternaturally quiet for somewhere so near the heart of a large, gregarious city.

Alarm turned to panic as Nigel started to run and the Mercedes screeched up onto the pavement in front of him. He turned again, launching himself into a sprint. That was when the second car rounded that far bend, and thundered towards him.

He knew it would block his way. Nigel stopped dead, his mind racing. Why the hell was this happening, now of all times? He wasn't on a hunt, he was on the other side of the Atlantic from Sydney – and he couldn't think of anything to do but yell!

So Nigel yelled for help – then fell quiet when a large man in sunshades and with his hair tied back into a mousy ponytail climbed out of the front seat of the first car and pointed a gun at him. Nigel recognized the man instantly. His vague hope that this was just Derek Lloyd pulling one of his tricks died an instantaneous death.

'I'd be a good boy and keep quiet, Nigey-boy,' stated the man with the gun. 'I wouldn't want to make a mess on that pretty pink shirt?'

'It's not pink, it's light red,' snarled Nigel. 'I thought you were rotting in jail, Bately!'

The gunman tipped forward his shades and peered down at Nigel with a malicious grin. 'Aw, you remember me. How sweet? Now shut up and get in, unless you want the rest of your clothes to match that _red_ shirt!'

Nigel didn't have much choice. Several men got out of the Mercedes behind, seized him by the back of his shirt and trousers and bundled him into the rear-seat of the car in front. One of them got in behind him and, on scrambling up into a sitting position, Nigel found himself ensconced between two much-larger men.

'Just when I thought things couldn't get any worse,' he thought miserably to himself, 'I get abducted in a London for the _second_ time. My home city! This is just embarrassing!'

When he saw was accompanying him, however, he realized that things had not just got _even_ worse. They'd got _indescribably _worse.

On one side sat Bellimo. He'd thought that bastard was locked up in Dartmoor Jail with Bately! It seemed not. He was right there and Nigel remembered only to well that promise that he'd made to him under Waterloo Bridge: it was Nigel Bailey he blamed for foiling his international murder and antique smuggling business, and he'd hold Nigel hostage until Sydney paid back every penny of what he'd lost and more. Nigel shuddered to his core: was that nightmare about to come true?

Bellimo was saying nothing, just staring straight ahead. Nigel, terrified, darted a glance the other way.

There, with an equally livid frown on his face, sat Fabrice Deviega.

'Oh God,' gasped Nigel silently. 'Talk about worst-case scenario!'

**Thanks for reading. Please review.**


	2. Underhand Dealings

**Disclaimers: as before**

**Thanks for those reviews. I really appreciate it :)**

**Here's some more of my Nano ramblings. Hope they make sense – don't worry, I did edit quite a bit!**

**CHAPTER TWO: UNDERHAND DEALINGS**

'Nigel…wait! Oh for goodness sake…err, sorry madam!'

As his younger brother fled the premises, Preston, without knowing quite why, felt compelled to chase him. He dodged through the miasma of fellow coffee drinkers, nearly sending flying a young woman with a tray who had been hovering hopefully over their table. Then he legged it down the escalator and off across the forecourt, all the while with Nigel still in his sights.

Whilst cursing both his brother and his actions, the notion flitted through his mind that he _had _been rather blatant – and, very possibly, a little mean. But, damn him, Nigel was just so bloody easy to wind up! The elder brother just couldn't help himself!

Preston plunged out through the large, swinging door at such a pace that the tall man on security muttered curtly into his 'walkie talkie'.

'Nigel, for Christ's sake, what's this all about? Wait!'

But Nigel, who was now already to the gate, didn't hear. It hadn't occurred to him for one second that Preston would bother to follow him.

'Excuse me, sir – I'm terribly sorry, but you left this on your table.'

Preston turned abruptly to see the woman he had nearly knocked over hurrying after him. She was around the same age as Nigel and, from her casual clothes, it was evident she was also a research student. Her brunette, wavy hair was scraped back into a short ponytail, and she was brandishing a small black mobile.

'Oh, I beg you pardon,' he flustered, slightly out of breath. 'But it isn't mine….oh! Of course, it's my brothers! Thank you so much. You really are awfully kind.'

The girl smiled awkwardly. 'It's a pleasure.' She glanced regretfully off in the direction of the younger brother, who had now disappeared, and returned with a sigh to her coffee and chocolate cake. She'd been searching in the library a humanities student _that_ cute for at least a decade. Finally she had spotted one and she'd been stalking him for days! But just as she was on the verge of actually making eye contact with him, he had run – literally run! – from the room, leaving her with the gawky, dull-looking elder brother. Maybe, she decided, she should give up and try scientists…

Meanwhile, Preston hadn't made any more progress after Nigel. He was getting fed up with this! Besides, now he had Nigel's phone, it was for his younger brother to come to _him _to get it back. He knew where he was!

Preston was about to shove the said object in his pocket and head back to his office at the British Museum, when it began to vibrate and beep in a most alarming manner: the combination of blips and blops formed themselves into Beethoven's 'Fleur de Lys'.

It was enough to make a music lover's skin crawl! 'I've got to switch this thing off,' he thought. But then he caught sight of the name flashing up on the little display: Sydney Fox.

There was no choice now. Preston gave a nervous cough and answered.

'Hello?'

'Hello? Uh, you're not Nigel.'

'No, it's Preston.'

There was a surprised pause, as Sydney thought: 'What the heck is _he_ doing answering Nigel's phone.'

'Oh,' she continued. 'Well, is Nigel there? I need to speak to him urgently.'

'I'm so sorry, he just popped off,' replied Preston, unable to control his curiosity. Had he been right about Sydney and Nigel's 'lover's tiff'?

'Um…could, I, err, take a message for him?'

Sydney's suspicion sparked. 'Nigel _is_ alright, isn't he? Where are you both?'

'Uh, the British Library. We were just having a coffee.'

'Oh, okay. That's good, in fact. That place is nice and crowded. Make sure Nigel doesn't leave before he calls me, though. It's _important_, Preston.'

'Fine,' responded the elder brother, cringing slightly at the implicit lie. 'I will. Are you sure there's no message? Nothing you want me to pass on to him? I am his brother you know? You can trust me.'

Sydney nearly exploded with disbelieving laughter; all Preston heard was a sudden fitful cough.

'Are you quite well, Professor Fox?'

'Yes…cough…yes! I'm good. Look, just get Nigel to call me ASAP. And…keep an eye on him, okay?'

'Err, okay, just out of interest, why …?' Before he'd even finished the sentence, however, the line had gone dead.

'What was all that about?' he pondered. ' Nigel shouldn't leave the library? Well, that ship has sailed!'

A disturbing though hit him as he slipped the phone into his jacket pocket. Could Nigel really be in danger? But if so, surely Sydney Fox would be here, not on the other side of the pond still?

He hurried to the gate of the complex and looked both ways. He could see neither hide nor hair of Nigel. The little sod could certainly move it when he had to!

Preston groaned and glanced at his watch. It had only been supposed to be a half-hour respite, a quick jaunt to the library – any excuse to get away from his insufferable boss. If he didn't get back to the Museum soon, however, he knew he'd be missed and in trouble…

With that, Preston Bailey straightened his jacket, adjusted his tie, and hurried across the pedestrian crossing, back towards the gracious colonnades and crowded corridors of his workplace.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Nigel's wary glances skirted from one angry bad-guy to the other. Neither of them were looking at him or speaking to him. Deviega had a handgun clenched in his first and vaguely pointing his way.

He tried to take a deep breath, but it caught painfully in his throat. 'I mustn't be scared,' he told himself. 'It's what they want.'

Yet who was he trying to kid? He was petrified.

The Mercedes was stuck in traffic. Although the windows were shaded, this was mightily obvious because the car was stalling much more than it was moving. When it did move, it shuffled forwards agonisingly slowly. It was inevitable really, at around noon on a busy working day in a major capital city. 'But then', thought Nigel, his distress growing, 'what's the rush? Sydney is on the other side of the world and might not know anything's wrong until…until…'

He tried to stop himself finishing that thought but, of course, he couldn't. Visions of his possible fate pounded his imagination, chilling him to the bone. Despite the unwanted body-heat that emanated from his two companions, he suddenly found he was shivering,

'My jumper,' thought Nigel miserable. 'I must have dropped it in the street when they shoved me into the car!' His anger swelled when he remembered why he had been there in the first place.

'This is all bloody Preston's fault! If it hadn't have been for him, I'd still be safe and warm in the Manuscripts Room. And now I've been kidnapped - again! - and I've not even got my phone or jumper so I'm going to be both untraceable _and_ cold. Great! Just great!'

As it came to a standstill again, vibrations from the engine of the petrol-guzzling vehicle juttered through Nigel's body, making him feel slightly sick. Still, his captors said nothing.

This was getting daft, decided Nigel. There must be a good reason for his abduction, besides bitter revenge - and these two lowlifes were going to have the common decency to tell him!

He mustered the best of his courage and asked quietly, although not with a tinge of sarcasm: 'Um, thanks for the ride…but would you be so kind as to tell me what all this is about? And then drop me off somewhere within easy walking distance of the nearest branch of Caffé Nero?'

Two sets of beady eyes swooped down onto him like vultures upon their prey. Nigel blanched and instantly regretted his pathetic attempt at humour.

'Sorry,' he murmured.

Deviega's chiming tones cut through the loaded atmosphere first: 'What is this all about?' he echoed sardonically. 'What _is_ this all about? Now let's get this clear – does your little inquiry concern anything other than the obvious: in other words, about how your life from now on will be being nasty, brutal and extremely short?'

Nigel stared down into his lap. How was he supposed to respond to _that_?

Then somebody seized his hair, jerking his head upwards and his chin up. He found himself staring unwillingly into Deviega's scarlet and angry face: 'Answer me, Bailey!'

'Uh…yes,' stuttered Nigel, doing his best to look pissed-off rather than horror-stricken. 'I want to know what this is about…and…and…'

Deviega laughed maliciously: 'So I'm supposing rightly that you want to know how you can extend that worthless life of yours a little?'

'Something like that,' replied Nigel, swallowing hard. 'Oh God, Sydney,' he thought. 'Will you ever even find my body?'

Deviega released him with such a forceful shove that Nigel crumpled back onto Bellimo's lap. He glanced up at the second crime lord's face only to receive a scowl of such hatred that even Sydney's hated nemesis seemed benign by comparison.

Bellimo was about a decade younger than Deviega, but appeared to have aged much in the past six months. The chunky teddy-bear good-looks that had helped him pass himself off as a university lecturer had been eroded by an onslaught of deep lines around his eyes and across his forehead, so distinct they could almost have been drawn by a biro. His full head of greying blond hair had receded greatly, and his nose and jaw seemed much more jagged and angular. It occurred to Nigel that the former dodgy antique's dealer might not have enjoyed his six months in jail! And that he probably held him – Nigel – almost entirely responsible.

He sat up quickly, before he could be forcibly removed.

'Show him, Bellimo,' barked Deviega. 'Let's see if it's worth keeping him from the mud at the bottom of the Thames.'

Bellimo pulled a yellowing sheet of paper from his pocket and handed it to Nigel, who instinctively pulled his glasses from the top pocket of his light-red shirt.

It was a rubbing of engraved hieroglyphs, evidently taken some time ago. They were arranged oddly in two columns rather than moving from right to left across the page, or visa versa, as was typical.

'A friend of mine once told me you claimed you could eat glyphs for breakfast,' leered Deviega, elbowing Nigel in the ribs. 'So let's see what you can do – unless you want to see your breakfast again!'

'It would be nice to have some lunch!' lamented Nigel silently, but concentrated hard on the hieroglyphs, wondering grimly what historical treasures he might be about to unwillingly betray.

Most of the symbols were easy to decipher and seemed to be constructed into some kind of love poem. The fist, a barbed arrowhead standing next to a ripple of water, and the profile of a human face, were the well-known emblem of a kiss: the start of any great love-affair. The next, a fish with water and a pair of embracing arms, spoke of a romantic caress. The last symbol, in the first column at least, spoke of the act of lovemaking itself: a quail chick, two bread loaves and a crude representation of the male member.

'This first column is about some sort of romance…' He began, and then broke off as Deviega jammed the gun into his stomach.

'If that's the best you can do, it's the Thames sludge by teatime. Any idiot can translate that - I thought you were a specialist! What does the second column say?'

Nigel swallowed hard and returned his attention to the paper. Focussing hard, he could almost blot out the feel of the cold steel of the gun-barrel that seeped through his thin shirt.

'Its…its about war…I think.'

'You think? We need answers or its _goodbye Bailey_!'

'Well…this top one is the sign for a ruler – the crook and the sloping hill, and the looped cord tell of military might…but these last two, I just can't be sure. I've seen this four-point star standing beside the female figure before, in my thesis research, and I _do _have some theories…but…but…I've not worked out the exact meaning yet. I probably could translate it, given time and access to my notes…and I need to know where this rubbing comes from and if there is any more of it, to be quite sure what it says. In these cases, context is everything.'

To Nigel's great relief, Deviega nodded slowly, as if this was an acceptable answer. Bellimo seemed satisfied too, and pointed to the bottom symbol, which resembled a tall obelisk surrounded by the same four-pointed stars. 'What do you make of this?'

Nigel focussed on the final motif and stifled a gasp. He did have a good idea what it was – but it was the last thing he wanted to tell these rogues about.

'I…I don't know.'

Deviega laughed dryly, jabbing the pistol harder into Nigel's middle. 'Don't think you can get away with bluffing us, Bailey. This isn't a game! Believe me, one false move and its going to hurt.'

'But…really, I don't know.'

Nigel never saw the blow coming; Bellimo's other fist knocked the wind from him completely, while Deviega's grabbed him by the hair again.

'Don't mess us around, Bailey. It's Cleopatra's Needle, isn't it?'

'Yes,' wheezed Nigel. Well, seeing as the bastards knew anyway, there wasn't much point in unnecessary suffering.

'Okay, boy, talk. Tell us everything you know.'

'Um…okay,' panted Nigel, still gathering his breath. He wished Deviega would let go of his hair – it was most uncomfortable. 'There are, uh, several Cleopatra's Needles. The most famous are a trio of granite obelisks that stand in London, Paris and New York. All are ancient Egyptian, acquired by the said cities over the past two centuries but none of them actually belonged to Cleopatra herself. In fact, they were all first erected in the Egyptian city of Heliopolis on the orders of Thutmose III, in around 1450 BC…of course, that's nearly fifteen centuries before the ill-fated reign of the famous Egyptian queen…'

Deviega yanked at his hair again. 'Stop stalling! Tell us what you know about the _real_ Cleopatra's needle! The one that stood in the court of the lady herself and on which she inscribed the declarations of her love for both Julius Caesar and Marc Anthony.'

'I don't know what you're talking about,' replied Nigel, his voice a whimper as he braced himself for another blow. Fortunately, it never came.

'Yes you do,' growled Deviega. 'You gave a paper on it at a Harvard Egyptology conference four months ago.'

'Oh…oh, _that_ Cleopatra's Needle!' Nigel feigned surprise but felt more that little grateful he'd got away with his lie relatively lightly.

'I…uh…haven't found out any more about it. At least no more than was in the essay.'

Before his breakthrough yesterday it _wouldn't _have been a lie. But it was now – and he could sense they knew it. But he could also tell they badly wanted any information about this obelisk, even though he wasn't quite sure why. If he could hold them off with a little enigmatic bluster, maybe it would keep him alive long enough for Sydney to catch up with them. Besides, he was now genuinely curious about something.

'Um…those hieroglyphs,' he ventured. 'Where did they come from? I mean, most people believe the obelisk was destroyed in the First World War, shortly after it was dug up by the Russian Egyptologist, Boris Dostoyevsky.'

'But you don't, do you? At least not according to your eloquent little paper!'

Oh, how Nigel cursed himself for having espoused his clever hypothesis so soon.

'Uh…no. But I have no proof.'

'Find any in Dostoyevsky's notes?'

Nigel groaned internally. 'Err, nothing much…'

Bellimo smashed his fist into Nigel's stomach again, leaving him gagging for air.

The antique dealer snorted at Deviega above Nigel's head. 'That'll do for now. He'll talk when we need him to, and he'll do the job. Just don't give him an inch.'

'You don't need to tell me how to handle a captive,' spat Deviega. 'You're an amateur Bellimo! Fox brought you down last time and now you're lucky to be on board with me. I'm the _only_ one who can handle her…'

He trailed off as the black screen that divided the back seat from the driver and passenger in the front slid suddenly open. The round, pasty face of Bately appeared, grinning hungrily.

Nigel, still struggling to regain his puff, responded to the revolting new sight with an angry glare. He knew exactly what that bastard wanted and, even if it killed him – which, it increasingly looked like it might – he wasn't going to let him have any of it! To make his point, he bore his teeth, mustering his best attempt at a feral snarl.

Unfortunately, Bately found this rather attractive: 'Having trouble with Nigey? I'll sort him out!'

'No doubt you will,' replied Deveiga, arching an eyebrow. 'All in good time. Nigel has started sharing some interesting information, and we eagerly anticipate the time when he learns to be even more generous.'

'Cool,' said Bately. 'So, have you asked him if he knows anything about the Amber Room?'

'The Amber Room!' gasped Nigel, unable to contain his intrigue. 'You mean the carved amber panels from the chamber of Peter the Great, unrivalled in their craftsmanship and beauty, and lost since they were looted by the Nazi's in World War Two?'

'Yeah, that's the one,' confirmed Bellimo angrily. 'Bateley, you idiot! He didn't need to know about that!'

'The Amber Room,' marvelled Nigel again. 'It's _the _Holy Grail to Relic Hunters! Apart from the Holy Grail itself, of course…'

'Okay, I've had enough of this,' snapped Bellimo. Pulling a heavy-looking spanner from his waistband, he raised it purposefully above the back of Nigel's head. Nigel scrunched up his eyes, bracing himself for the blow he was pretty sure was coming. Deviega, however, grabbed the other man's wrist before he could carry out the dreadful deed.

'No! As much as I despise Fox's lapdog, we need him in working order. He needs to be able to _think_, at least.'

Nigel breathed a sigh of semi-relief, which jammed in his lungs like iron when he saw Deviega pull a large bottle of brown-looking liquid and a cloth out of the pocket in the seat in front of him.

'Let's do this properly,' he growled. In one all-too-fast movement he poured the liquid onto the cloth, and slammed it down over Nigel's nose and mouth. The younger man tried to wriggle away, but somebody held him fast. The pungent odour of chemicals gushed through his airwaves for a second, making his stomach wrench. Then everything went black.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Preston only thought about his younger brother again as he was about to leave to office. As usual, he jumped straight to the hat-stand as the clock struck five, took down his overcoat, and pulled from his pocket the oyster card that would convey him home.

'Damn it,' he thought, as his hand brushed on Nigel's phone, also still cosseted in his jacket. 'The ungrateful sod never came over to pick it up! Well, that's his lookout - I'm going home! He can come and get it from me there or live without it!'

He was half way to the tube-station when a pesky sense of responsibility kicked in.

'Damn! Damn! Damn! Nigel, why do you always have to be such an inconvenience?'

His better nature winning over, Preston Bailey did an about-turn and stomped off back towards the British Library.

Mild concern turned to genuine worry when he reached the cosy little corner behind the oak bookcase where Nigel had been working.

Everything was just as Nigel had left it before they went out for coffee. His neatly written notes were splayed all over the desk, the folder of aging manuscripts lay open in just the same place. His neatly sharpened pencil was just where he had placed it as he rose to flee the room.

'Oh God, Nigel, where _are_ you?'

Then something caught Preston's attention. Sticking out from the top of folder of documents was the manuscript that Nigel had been studying when he arrived, and which he had quickly tucked underneath a blank envelope so it couldn't be easily read. Preston pulled it out. It was a handwritten shipping bill dated October 1915, and signed by Boris Dostoyevsky.

'Boris Dostoyevsky, Boris Dostoyevsky…' Preston mulled over the name. 'Wasn't he the Egyptologist who was supposed to have uncovered the _real_ Cleopatra's Needle before it was destroyed by the Jerries or something in early 1916…oh!'

Preston froze with amazement as he read what the shipping bill was for: one large, stone obelisk of Ancient Egyptian origin. According to this document, signed and stamped, it was transported from Cairo to St Petersburg in late 1915.

'Good heavens, Nigel! What were you on to? This could be the greatest find of the 21st century!'

Sweat began to prick on the back of Preston's neck even as the idea struck him. Chances are, Nigel was just throwing a hissy-fit, right? He'd taken an afternoon off – hell, the man he affectionately referred to as Podge was probably sitting in the window of the Pizza Express opposite stuffing his face!

Still, he knew what he was about to do was immoral. If he was caught, he could be arrested. But…if he wasn't? Well, then he, Preston Bailey, could be the one to engineer a magnificent discovery and get the glory he so deserved for a change!

Preston glanced over his shoulder and checked nobody was looking. Then, with the dexterity, if not the assurance, of a professional thief, he folded the browning piece of paper in half and tucked it in his top pocket.

'Aaaargh!'

Preston nearly jumped a mile in the air as Nigel's phone began to blare out 'Fleur de Lys' from his pocket. Every eye in the room was suddenly wrested upon him.

'Sorry, sorry,' he flustered and, fumbling to turn it off, he dashed from the manuscripts department.

The phone was still ringing as Preston tore past another annoyed looking security guard and back into the foyer. He was so panicked that it was chiefly through luck that he even found the answer button.

'Hello!'

'Preston? Where's Nigel? He never called. Did you give him my message?'

'No…but it isn't my fault. I just haven't seen him. I waited for ages, though.'

Preston could sense the mounting tension through Sydney's silence. 'Okay, Preston,' she said slowly. 'This is serious. Nigel could be in real trouble.'

'Why? Look, if you'd told me more earlier it might have helped. What's he gone and got himself mixed up in now?'

'I can't explain that over the phone,' barked Sydney in a tone that Preston daren't argue with. 'I need you to help me. Look for Nigel, look everywhere, and ask around and find out if anybody has seen him. Keep the phone on - I'll be in touch.'

She hung up without even saying goodbye. 'Bloody Yanks – no manners at all,' sniffed Preston.

Still, he was certainly now a little alarmed about Nigel – and not a little intrigued as to whether finding his brother could lead him even close to locating a highly career-enhancing relic.

He sauntered back over towards the coffee bar. No doubt Nigel spent a lot of time there. Somebody must have seen something.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Preston turned up nothing but blank stares, until he made an inquiry at another coffee bar, a kiosk located outside library, just before the gate.

The girl there remembered Nigel; in fact, she seemed to know him quite well. The very mention of his name brought a coy smile to her lips, and her cheeks flushed pink. 'How does he do it?' wondered Preston. 'She's a pretty one, too! How does he charm them all - and scarcely even notice?'

The girl, Ellie, had seen Nigel leaving in a hurry just before lunchtime. He'd not stopped to say 'hi', which she thought was odd as there'd been no queue at her kiosk at the time. He'd looked upset, and she had wondered why.

'He turned right out of the gate,' she said. 'After that, I couldn't see him.'

'Thanks for your help,' said Preston, favouring her with his most beguiling smile.' Maybe I'll drop by tomorrow for a coffee.' Ellie, however, looked far from thrilled at the prospect.

'Typical', grumbled Preston to himself as he hurried towards the gate.

He turned right, as instructed, but then wondered where on earth he was going. From here, Nigel could have gone anywhere. This was pointless!

He was just crossing the side street before Euston, harbouring strong intentions of catching the tube home, when something caught his attention. There were tyre marks on the road; heavy, dark ones, the sort left when a weighty vehicle screeched to a halt.

'Bloody bad drivers, making a mess all over the roads,' he thought smugly. 'They should travel on the Underground like a decent citizen. I hope they paid the Congestion Charge!'

He was about to pass on when something else flickered into the corner of his vision. It was nothing out of the ordinary: somebody had left a jumper lying on the pavement. But he recognised it instantly. It was the blue woolly sweater that Nigel had been wearing earlier.

Preston ran over and picked it up; it was Nigel's, unmistakably. It smelt, it even felt like his brother, both scratchy and soft.

A lump formed in his throat. What had happened to him? The tyre marks started to take on horrendous new meanings.

The phone in his pocket rang again and he answered it in an instant: 'Sydney, this is serious. Nigel is in trouble!'

'I know,' she agreed. 'What've you found, Preston?'

'His jumper, by the side of the road… I suppose he could have just dropped it…but, there's tyre marks…oh God, who's got him, Sydney?'

'Where are you?'

'Uh, up the side turning before Euston station. But what does it matter to you? It'll take you over eight hours to get here!'

'Don't bet on it, Preston.'

'What? What do you mean? Where are you?'

The phone line went dead before the reply came loud and clear: 'I'm right here!'

Indeed, there she was. Sydney Fox was standing on the corner in front of Euston station, not ten metres away from where Preston stood, clutching his brothers jumper.

'What? How?'

'It's a long story,' panted Sydney. 'But I have to go after Nigel, and I have to go now! And I need every bit of information you can possibly give me if we're going to find him alive!'

**Thanks for reading. Please review.**


	3. Boats and Bedsits

**Disclaimers: as before**

**Thanks for those reviews. Here's more of my Nano ravings. I hope you enjoy them! Apologies in advance for the Nigel meanness over the next few chapters and lots of English slang.**

CHAPTER THREE: BOATS AND BED-SITS

'How on earth did you get here so soon?' spluttered Preston. 'I mean, I only called you four hours ago. It's impossible - even for you!'

'I got on a flight from Boston last night,' replied Sydney, who had now come over and was gently prying Nigel's jumper away from him. 'By the time he called me, I was already checked in on the flight – which, of course was horribly delayed as ever – and I couldn't reply!'

'Oh,' was all Preston managed. 'What a shame.'

'Yeah, well, when I called him - well, _you_ - earlier, I'd not yet reached customs and it took me all this time just to get through and get here. I nearly kicked a few of those airport officials in the head! I guess they were only doing their jobs, though…'

She trailed off, frowning with concern, as she started to examine the blue pullover. There was no sign of tearing or, thank goodness, of blood, though her worry still grew by the second.

'What do we do now, then?' asked Preston, already sounding weary of the whole affair. 'I mean, it's a case of 'straight to the police', surely?'

'No. They wouldn't be able to do a thing. This is already way above that.'

'Way above that? What the hell? This is my little brother, not the bloody Prime Minister! And we can't even be sure he's been taken, however bad it looks. I mean, maybe he just dropped his sweater and the tyre marks were a coincidence.' Preston scratched his head in frustration; it was starting to drizzle and his ready-meal was calling to him. 'Look, Professor Fox – will you please tell me what this is all about?'

Sydney regarded Preston through narrowed eyes. As she was sure Nigel had once said of him: 'she didn't trust him any further than she could throw him.' On the other hand, he was the last person to spend time with her assistant before he was snatched and there was a chance – albeit a small one – that Nigel might have shared with him some information about his research, and which could just hold the key to finding him.

'Sydney, please?' begged Preston. 'Either you let me in on this, or I'm going to the police…not that there's much for them to go on! Let's face it, he's 28-years-old and, God help us, apparently sound of mind. They're hardly going to take this case seriously when he'd only been gone three hours and, well, I don't even know where Nigel was staying!'

'I do,' stated Sydney, 'and that's where we're going now. I need to make some phone-calls on the way, but I'll do my best to fill you in!'

'…as much as I have to,' thought Sydney to herself.

'Fine,' replied Preston, although he sounded about as enthusiastic as a Turkey about Christmas. Yet the annoying niggle that persistently told him Nigel was all the family he had, compelled him to follow Sydney as she marched into the forecourt of Euston station and commandeered a black taxi-cab.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

When Nigel 'came to', his first awareness was of complete disorientation. He was asleep, so why wasn't he lying down? He certainly felt nauseas, so why wasn't he in a bed? What was that awful, petrol-like smell? Why couldn't he move his left arm…and why, oh why was the floor moving?

Oh God, he felt sick!

Nigel opened his eyes and retched once. Nothing came out; he just choked on some bitter tasting saliva. Flopping back against a hard wall with a resounding clang, his left arm still forced up behind him, he tried to register his surroundings. Against a growing sense of dread, the whole awful memory of his abduction came flooding back.

The only light filtered into the small compartment from a tiny, round porthole, on the far-side. Not that the room was big, it was about three metres square and decorated with peeling, grey paint. The only furnishing was a single, wooden chair, placed well out of Nigel's reach. He also worked out that his arm was immobilised because it was handcuffed to a thick, metal pipe that ran the entire length of one wall at a height just above his head when he sat. So that was why he couldn't lie down!

At this particular moment, this last matter bothered Nigel most about the whole situation. Although he no longer felt as if he was about to throw up, he still felt pretty dreadful. Lying down, even here, appealed more than anything in the world.

He knew he was on a boat, and they were already at sea. The stench was that of oil and engine grease, and the swell of the waves was causing the vessel to buck and tilt constantly. He couldn't think of a more miserable situation. How would Sydney ever find him here? She probably didn't even know he was gone yet, and that ass Preston would never care to notice.

He wanted to cry, but could never allow that. He knew his kidnappers could appear anytime, so he swallowed the lump in his throat and tried to take his mind off the knotted mess in his stomach. Unfortunately, his thoughts could wander only on to one thing.

'They're going to kill me,' he muttered to himself. 'I might as well tell them everything, at least make it easy.' But he knew he wouldn't and, feeling as destitute as he did, Nigel cursed himself for his bloody-minded sense of honour.

He'd fight them to the end. He hoped.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Nigel had been staying at a bed-sit in Hammersmith, belonging to a friend who was currently engaged in an archaeological dig down in Wessex. Sydney had the cab-driver take them straight there and divulged information to Preston on a 'need-to-know' basis on the way.

It had all started, she suspected now, when she received a visit at Trinity from an English woman named Ann-Marie, about two weeks ago. Tall, mousy-haired, faintly freckled, and in her late 30s, Ann-Marie had told her she was revising a text on decoding Egyptian hieroglyphs, and was interested in Nigel's research into dialectics of cultural change and exchange in the evolution of glyphs. After breaking the news about his study-leave, Sydney had been happy enough to pass on Nigel's email address, knowing he would be chuffed to chat about his findings with another enthusiast. Apparently satisfied, Ann-Marie had smiled and left. Sydney had though little more of her – until yesterday, that was.

It was around noon, East-Coast Time, when Sydney received an alarming phone-call from a secretary at MI5. British Intelligence, it seemed, had some bad news for her. There had been a major jail-break from Her Majesty's Prison on Dartmoor the previous day, and among the escapees were none-other than two lifers: Bellimo and Bately. Bellimo had gone down cursing Sydney and Nigel's names and swearing revenge. So this was a gentle warning from the British Government: be vigilant and report anything suspicious immediately.

The moment she'd put the phone-down, she had tried to call Nigel. No answer, of course: he was in the library. Karen had booked her a seat on the first flight to Heathrow before the minute was up.

It was then, even before she'd left the university, that the second phone-call came. It was from Ann-Marie.

'Nigel is in danger,' she said, her voice a hoarse whisper as if she was scared someone was listening in. 'He's stumbled onto something big – too big! You must come to London, now.'

'I'm already on my way,' Sydney had said. 'Is this about Bellimo?'

But the line had gone dead.

'That's what I know, so far,' concluded Sydney to Preston, as the taxi forged on through the quagmire of beeping and floundering commuter traffic.

'Odd,' mused Preston, but the yellowing shipping document that was still burning a hole in his top-pocket was starting to make sense. He considered mentioning it, but then stalled. 'All in good time,' he thought.

'Uh, so what was Nigel's research about?' he asked. 'You think that's the reason he's been kidnapped, or is it just this Bellimo guy out for revenge.'

'I'm not sure,' breathed Sydney, also unwilling to let him know too much for now. 'At least, I don't know what he'd stumbled upon since he's been in London. But, hopefully, that's what we're about to find out.'

It was dark by the time that the car reached the Goldhawk Road, and pulled up in front of a hairdresser's that had shut up shop for the day.

'Is this is?' asked Preston. 'Dear God, he's got a perfectly good bedroom in Hampstead with me! Why on earth does he choose to stay in this dump?'

'Have you ever tried asking him?' muttered Sydney, but right now Preston's snobbism was the least of her worries. In front of the cab, she noticed a parked police car, one of its blue lights still flashing ominously. A tall-helmeted Metropolitan Police Officer was taking notes and listening intently to a fast-talking Greek lady who was continually pointing to the second story garret windows above the shop.

'What's going on?' asked Sydney, pushing her way to the front of a small-group of nosy by-standers.

'Who are you, Miss?'

'My name is Sydney Fox, and I'm a Professor of Ancient Studies at an American university. My friend, Nigel Bailey, has been staying here - in that top apartment I believe. I'm here with his brother.' Here she gestured at Preston who had only just got out of the cab, and was still hanging to the back of the crowd.

'Do you know where Mr. Bailey is now?' asked the policeman.

'No.'

The policeman sighed. 'Well, that's a shame, because we'd very much like to know why his flat has been the target of an armed robbery this afternoon.'

'An armed robbery?' squeaked Preston, who had finally ploughed his way through to the hub of the action. 'What the…? I've never know Nigel to have anything worth stealing in this life. Well, apart from maybe…' He trailed off, even Preston knowing better than to splay details of Sydney and Nigel's relic hunting career to the cops at this moment.

'Mr Bailey,' said the policeman gravely. 'Is there any possibility that your younger brother could have been involved in some sort of drug activity?'

Preston was aghast: 'What? No! Absolutely no way! This is ridiculous, a completely unwarranted assault on the family name and on my brother's reputation. Nigel would _never_, _ever_ get mixed up in such a thing! It's unthinkable! I'll…I'll sue the pants off of anyone who perpetuates such a lie!'

Sydney had to repress a smile; for once, she was almost proud of Preston. She silenced him, all the same, with a sharp kick to the ankle.

'Nigel wasn't involved in drug-dealing, Constable. He was a history research student – and my assistant. My belief is that he had discovered some valuable information that somebody else wanted badly.'

'A history student?' The policeman looked entirely unconvinced. 'Don't they spend their time looking up dates and names, and conjugating Latin verbs?'

'Things have moved on a little since then,' smiled Sydney through gritted teeth.

'Well, whatever he does, I'd like to have a few words with him. Where is your assistant?'

'He's missing,' blurted Preston, and then withered slightly as Sydney shot him a serious look. She had been on the verge of coming up with a _great_ cover story!

'He's missing!' The policemen stroked his chin. 'Hmmmmm. I'm afraid this is still all pointing to drug-related crime. Look at his profile: single, Caucasian, mid-to-late 20's… and no evidence of a permanent UK address for the past four years! '

'I don't have time for this,' snapped Sydney. Pulling a piece of paper from her satchel, she shoved it into the momentarily-silenced policeman's hand. 'Look, call that number. I've a feeling somebody pretty high-up might tell you you're off the case! Preston!' She grabbed the elder Bailey abruptly by the arm. 'Come on; let's go check out the damage.'

Ignoring the policeman and the hairdresser's protests, she pushed her way through the orange plastic tape that cordoned off the crime scene, and started up the narrow, carpeted flight of stairs that led to Nigel's flat.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Nigel was trying to think positively. It wasn't easy, in the circumstances, but sitting there feeling poorly and sorry for himself was just too depressing. So he asked himself the question, 'What would Sydney do?'

Unfortunately, no answer was particularly forthcoming, apart from trying to kick the metaphorical and actual 'asses' of Bately, Deviega Bellimo and however many henchman they had on the ship at their beck and call. The thought of that manoeuvre, inevitably, didn't make him feel a great deal better, as he hardly saw himself as capable of executing it.

So he turned his attention to the occasions that he had got himself out of nasty spots by himself in the past. There was that time, he recalled with a hint of pride, when he was stuck in that madman's basement in the Ural Steppes, and he'd really been quite inventive with the cutlery and the swipe-card. Granted, Sydney and that willowy blonde Russian agent had been a little bit of help, but _he'd_ got himself out! He'd done it once, he could do it again! He tried not to be put off by the matter that this time he was at sea, probably in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean – or God knows where – by now. In fact, the memory gave him an idea.

With his free hand Nigel reached into his pocket and pulled out his plastic British Library Reader's Card. Then, very gingerly, he stood up, and began examining the handcuffs, to see if there were any screws that he could use the card to loosen. Unfortunately, there weren't any, although he tried to jam the corner of the card into the lock, and use it to hack against the seams on the thinner part of the chains. He had little luck.

Not to be deterred, Nigel began to slide the cuffs along the pipe, examining the iron fitting as carefully as he could in the dim light. From the creaks and groans that echoed perpetually around him, he could tell he was on a rusty old vessel on the verge of falling to pieces. Surely, if there was a join somewhere, he could jam the card into it and pry apart the pipe?

'Surely,' whispered Nigel to himself hopefully, even as his pessimistic side shouted 'sense' viciously in his ears: 'even if you get away from the pipe, how do you get out of the room, and off the ship. You're scuppered this time, Bailey! Just co-operate or they'll beat you or worse, and then they'll kill you.'

'No,' he whispered to himself, 'everything will be fine. Just go with the flow…'

Still, Nigel had little less success in this exercise. There was only a single join in the pipe, and it was solidly soldered together. After a few minutes, he couldn't prevent himself slumping to the floor with a sickly groan. Was it him, or were the waves on this sodding ocean getting rougher? And, hell, although the thought of food made him feel even worse, he was just _so_ hungry! And why was the bloody room starting to spin…

It was partially fortunate that Nigel was still in this pitiable state when Bellimo opened the door to the cell. The former dodgy dealer was in a stinking mood - as he had been for the past six months since Nigel ruined his magnificent empire. To have caught the 'nasty little runt', as he was fond of calling Nigel, in the midst of an escape attempt could only have ended in violence.

Nigel, for his part, did his best to pretend he was still unconscious – but when the newcomer flicked on a preternaturally bright light-bulb, he couldn't help flinching, even beneath closed lids. So much for that plan!

'Okay, Bailey. Time to earn your keep!'

'What keep?' protested Nigel, shading his eyes as he squinted up against the light. 'I'm starving! If you expect me to be able to concentrate on anything at all, I need something to eat…ah, but seeing as I'm also chronically SEASICK, I'm probably likely to throw up anything I eat over your precious research…so, uh, maybe you should just drop me off at the next port, huh?'

Although superficially proud of this vaguely perspicuous attempt at defiance, Nigel started to regret it the instant that Bellimo seized him by the collar and hauled him up, his chained arm dragging painfully behind him.

'This is your _only_ warning, Bailey,' spat Bellimo. 'Last time I gave you an inch, you brought my house down. This time, you do what we say, when we say, or it's over. And I'll give you over to Bately, first, I promise you!'

The other man's saliva sprayed his face and made him feel more wretched than ever. Nigel nodded wanly, and crumpled back in a submissive heap as soon as he was released.

Bellimo disappeared for a second before returning with two familiar looking blue ring-binders, neatly labelled and organised with some multi-coloured W.H.Smith's dividers. Nigel instantly recognised them as his own. Bellimo dumped them on the floor next to him, then brought in a pile of less-familiar papers, on the top of which were the rubbings of the hieroglyphs he had been shown in the car.

'We've got more of your crap on the upper deck, but all the stuff on the Egyptian symbols seemed to be in those two folders. Do you need anything more to translate this stuff?'

'I…I don't know,' whispered Nigel, now absorbing the shocking realisation that not only did these awful men have him at their complete mercy, but they had violated his personal belongings as well. 'Um…there's a small white ring-bound notebook that I need, and there's a textbook by somebody called Blundell Hughes that might help …are they there?'

'I'll see what I can do. No stalling, mind, it won't help you. Neither will jumping ship. We won't be hitting a port for several days – and it's a choppy North Sea crossing to Siberia, my boy!'

A glimmer of Bellimo's former charm returned as he offered Nigel a smarmy grin. Nigel, however, just nodded silently. His misery sunk lower ever as the door slammed and the metallic echo of Bellimo's footsteps faded up the corridor.

They'd been thought his stuff - how thorough had they been? He prayed to God they'd not dug too deep…

And Siberia! He'd never been to Siberia, not even with Sydney. Right now, moreover, it sounded the easiest place in the world to never be found – as well as _bloody_ cold!

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

When she threw open the door to Nigel's bed-sit, even Sydney drew a sharp-intake of breath. She'd had her office turned-over a few times – hell, somebody had even had a go at her house once, but she'd never seen a place as badly smashed up as this.

Everything was overturned including the bed, chairs and desk. Even the sink had been, rather unnecessarily, wrenched off the wall. Broken china and the glass from a mirror were scattered everywhere. The bedclothes and mattress, even Nigel's clothes, had been rifled through and were strewn across the floor. However, there was no sign of the one thing that would have made this apartment truly Nigel's: books and research notes. They were all gone.

'Good God, what a state,' murmured Preston. 'How could he have brought himself to live in such a place?'

'It was probably quite nice once,' retaliated Sydney. 'Just the sort of place Nigel would have liked. He would have kept it tidy, the fittings were modern…' She paused, picking up a brown plastic comb from the floor, which she vaguely recognised from sharing rooms and tents with Nigel on hunts. 'You should be pleased it wasn't your house messed up this way; your personal belongings treated like so much trash.'

'That's a very good point! If Nigel had been staying with me and these rogues broke in, who knows what might have been taken? I suppose we should be glad it was just Nigel's grotty little…' He trailed off as he caught sight of Sydney's angry glare. 'Of course, the whole affair is terrible.'

Sydney was now rummaging around the debris, but with increasingly diminishing hope. 'They've taken every bit of his research, everything at all related to it - apart from what he left at the British Library, I guess. We'd better head there next, before that's swiped too. Damn! If only I'd been here!'

'Well, everything's easy in hindsight,' sighed Preston, who always prided himself on drawing out an appropriate cliché for any occasion. 'But I'm sure they didn't take _everything_.'

'They seem to have done!' Sydney nearly kicked the bedstead in frustration. 'I'd better try and contact MI5 about Bellimo, and that Ann-Marie woman. We've got to get a solid lead on whose behind this…what are you doing?'

Preston had started treading very deliberately across the room, bouncing his shiny, black shoes up and down on each uncovered floor-board as he reached it. 'Uh, well… you see, since he was a little boy, Nigel has always been a bit of squirrel!'

'A squirrel? What the heck are you talking about?'

'Our Podge always used to like to 'squirrel' things away under mattresses, behind bricks, beneath floorboards. Anything precious he had, pocket money, diaries, choccies, naughty girlie-mags, were usually tucked away somewhere where he thought nobody else could find it. And nobody else _could_ … apart from a skilful elder brother! A-ha!'

Preston was now jiggling up and down on a particularly squeaky floorboard. Sydney had pushed him out of the way in a second, and the next she had pulled up the tell-tale wooden plank, which was not even nailed down.

Preston crouched down beside her as she reached into the dark space beneath the floor and retrieved a small, red metal safe. Naturally, it was locked, but she knew that breaking in wouldn't present any difficulty at all.

All the same, as she was about to wrench it open, she hesitated.

This was not a relic belonging to somebody long dead. This belonged to Nigel; _her_ Nigel. Guilt coursed through her in a sudden torrent: what right had she to be breaking into his personal belongings - just about the only personal belongings he had left, it seemed - after everything that had happened between them?

Her memory flitted back to the last days before he left the university. Why couldn't she have just talked to him, told him how difficult she was finding it, that she needed time to adjust - that, at the core of things, she was just darn scared of commitment! He would have understood, she knew, but she just couldn't find the words. She hated herself for letting him go like that.

'What are you waiting for?' demanded Preston. 'If Nigel had anything important, he would have hidden it, and if you don't hurry up and open that thing, _I'll_ do it! You do want to find him, don't you?'

'Yes, I do,' thought Sydney. 'More than I've ever wanted to find anything.'

'Sorry Nigel,' she whispered, and broke into the box.

**Thanks for reading. Please Review.**


	4. Dissemblance

**Disclaimers: as before.**

**More of my Nano ravings! Thanks for those reviews! Very much appreciated :)**

CHAPTER FOUR: DISSEMBLANCE

Sydney had Nigel's mini-safe cracked open in a second. But it was not without a further pang of guilt that she began rummaging through the contents.

The first thing she picked up was a black college diary that didn't have many entries - at least none of a personal nature. It mainly contained notes on hieroglyphs and other aspects of his studies and it appeared, from the relative scrappiness on his handwriting, that these had been taken on the hoof rather than in the library. There was a whole page on the glyphs on the Rosetta Stone, for example. Preston delighted in telling her that this was in the British Museum, and that Nigel had probably taken the notes there.

'As if I don't know that!' she thought. All the same, Sydney pocketed the little notebook.

The box also contained the only letter she had sent Nigel since he'd arrived in London. It was a friendly account of the hunt she'd been on to retrieve an Aztec burial urn, and how she'd missed his expertise. She noted, with some comfort, it been read and was obviously cherished. Without quite knowing why, she pocketed it with the diary, ignoring Preston's shout of: 'But _that's_ from you! It's hardly going to hold the key to the mysteries of the universe, is it?'

'I won't even ask what that's supposed to mean,' she muttered, and turned her attention to the only remaining contents of the box: a small pile of photographs.

The couple on top wrung at her heartstrings. They were both of her and Nigel, taken on hunts some time back. There they were in the Three Rivers region of China, just after they'd discovered the Jade Empress. They were both smiling and laughing, her arm looped casually around his shoulders. Her father had taken that one. Boy, she had been happy that day, after everything with Jenny had been sorted out!

The second photo had been snapped sometime on an expedition into the Peruvian jungle. She couldn't remember who took it – maybe they'd shoved the camera on auto – but they were about mucking about: she was pretending to throttle him! In the next shot, she recalled, she'd even stuck out her tongue! Ha! They'd had a lot of fun on that trip, despite the bugs, the heat and the murderous bad guys…

'It was always fun,' she thought sadly to herself. 'Why did it have to go wrong…was it _really _all my fault?'

'Well those are a lot of use,' scoffed Preston. Completely oblivious to Sydney's misty-eyed emotions, he seized the photos from her hands. 'What else is there?...Oh, that's Mum and Dad…hmph! I see Nigel doesn't keep a visual depiction of his beloved elder brother in his little box of treasures…bloody hell! What's that?'

Sydney had frozen, utterly entralled by the final photograph. 'My God, Nigel...why didn't you tell me about _this_?'

This picture was quite unlike the others. It was an old sepia shot, covered with brown damp-spots and torn and ragged around the edges. It depicted a sturdily built middle-aged man with a regal-looking pointed beard, military insignia and impressive epaulettes on the shoulders. Next to him stood a girl of about thirteen or fourteen with a ribbon in her thick, long hair and a coy, almost inscrutable smile on her face. They were standing in front of a tall, stone obelisk, which was emblazoned with inscriptions - although the decayed quality of the photograph rendered them impossible to read.

Sydney could hear Preston panting heavily in her ear: 'Isn't that…isn't that…?'

'Yes, I think it is. It's Tsar Nicholas II…and the little girl, well, I'd put money on that being the Grand Duchess Anastasia! And, as far as I tell, what they are standing in front of is…'

'…Cleopatra's Needle. _The_ Cleopatra's Needle! The one, ahem, destroyed in the First World War!'

'Yes, but Nigel believed otherwise.'

'_Really_?'

'Yes, really! And I agreed with him. You see, if it _was_ destroyed, it would have had to have been completely obliterated. Not even a fragment was ever recovered – and that's pretty odd for a solidly built stone object of that size in an incident involving crossfire. Nigel had a theory that the obelisk was smuggled out of Egypt by Boris Dostoyevsky himself, who then perpetuated the myth of its destruction. It was one of the things he was trying to follow up in London, having discovered the archaeologist's papers the British Library - and even _they_ weren't easy to locate. It took him nearly a month of sorting through deposits from the 1920's before he found them, apparently filed under a completely different name, Anna…uh, something, I don't quite remember the surname. He emailed me about it.' She smiled affectionately. 'He was so excited, I could feel it from thousands of miles away…'

'Dear God – this is amazing! Do you think that's where he found the photograph?'

Sydney frowned thoughtfully: 'I have no idea! But it wouldn't be like Nigel to going stealing things from the British Library collections. As much as we both bend the rules on hunts, I can't see him doing that.'

'Absolutely not, its quite illegal,' said Preston, glad she wasn't looking his way to see him flush crimson. 'But why didn't he tell us…I mean you, about it? If the photograph shows that the Needle made it to Russia, it's quite a break-though.'

'But it doesn't _prove_ anything,' pointed out Sydney. 'It's difficult to tell where this was taken – the Tsar and his daughter could easily have posed in front of the obelisk on a visit to Egypt.'

'That's not what Nigel believed, though, is it?'

'No, I don't think he did,' admitted Sydney, placing the photograph back in the box and popping the whole thing into her satchel. 'Come on, Preston – next stop, the British Library.'

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Nigel fought his growing faintness to try and make sense of the hieroglyphs. It was far from an easy task. Below the top page of rubbings were at least fifty further such pages with impressions of faded and incomplete Egyptian symbols. It was impossible to put them in order at this stage, so he worked on one page at a time – and even this was extremely hard with one hand chained behind him.

As he had identified before, around half of the symbols were familiar to him. They were the continuance of the 'love poem' he had pointed out in the car and told the story of a Queen's love for two powerful men. Despite everything, Nigel found this very exciting: could these really be the inscriptions on Cleopatra's Needle itself, telling of the love-affair between herself and her two loves: Caesar and Marc Anthony? It seemed a strong possibility!

The other half, nevertheless, proved a lot tougher. Many of them used symbols that Nigel was unfamiliar with: there was the re-occurring star motif he'd seen in the car, strange zigzag-like writing, and the continuing interweaving of the symbol of the Needle itself. With his single hand, he kept on having to put down the papers and reach across to his notes and books. Yet they only confirmed his suspicions that he couldn't yet understand these glyphs because nobody had ever seen anything like it – at least not for the best part of one hundred years.

The few symbols that he did comprehend, however, gave him at least a theory for what it was all about – albeit it one that made him increasingly uncomfortable. The twisted flax, the vulture and the symbol of the tumour were frighteningly prevalent amongst the unfamiliar formulations. Nigel knew all too well what these symbols, typical at the peak of Egyptian power, spoke about: war, destruction, rotting and death.

'Lovely,' he murmured to himself. 'This is the last thing I want to be dwelling on right now…'

Nigel started as a key turned in the lock; his heart began to thud so heavily it hurt. 'I'm not ready,' he whimpered to himself. 'I need more time…'

Still, he tried to convince himself he'd rather be punished for finding nothing, that be forced to betray anything valuable to these bastards – but the cold sweat trickling down the back of his neck spoke otherwise.

Deviega's bulky figure filled the entire doorway, and Nigel intuitively shrunk back under the pipe, feeling very small. Nevertheless, the crime-lord didn't look particularly angry: his mouth formed a flat, almost benign slit in his craggy face; heavy, grey bags under his eyes indicated a benignly weary air. In one hand he was carrying a tray.

'Hello Bailey? Got anything for us?'

'Uh…maybe,' said Nigel quietly, loathing his compliance. 'But I'm not sure, I need more time. And, honestly, I must have some more information about where these rubbings are from? Could they be from the Needle itself?'

Deveiga regarded him placidly for a second, making Nigel fear this was the calm before the storm. He stared at the psychopathic criminal's large, black jack-boots and wondered miserably if he was about to kick him with them.

Instead, however, Deveiga leant down and placed the tray next to Nigel. On it was a bottle of water and an entirely unappetising-looking sandwich. He pulled the chair out of the corner and sat down on it.

'So, what have you got for me? You can have something to eat first - no rush, but I'd like hear what you've turned up so far.'

Nigel gawped up at him for a moment. Fabrice Deviega was being nice? Okay, it was only a _relative_ sort of nice, and he was speaking to him with the patronising air of a school-teacher addressing a particularly dense five-year-old, but it was certainly preferable to being kicked!

Temporarily lost for words, he nodded hastily.

'Do you want something to drink?'

Deviega unscrewed the blue-plastic lid from the bottle of water and offered it to him. Nigel took it, mumbled 'thank you', and then took a tentative sip. It didn't taste poisoned – so he followed this up with a far more enthusiastic gulp.

'Better?' asked Deviega.

'Not really,' murmured Nigel, wiping the back of his hand across his lips. 'Now I just feel sick…'

'Seasick, eh?'

'Something like that.'

The very sight of the sandwich, which contained some revolting sort of processed meat, turned Nigel's stomach, hungry though he was. He left that for now.

'What do you want, Deviega? Sydney…Sydney _will_ find us...and then...'

'Don't try my patience, Bailey. Right now, believe it or not, I'm the best friend you've got.'

Deviega still showed no sign of temper, but he leaned down to towards Nigel as he spoke, his face hovering only inches from his captive's. 'What do the hieroglyphs say?'

'Well….there's two columns, one is a love poem…;

'We're not interested in that,' said Deviega with a dismissive flap of his hand. 'What does the other column say?'

'Well, that's the one I'm just not sure about,' admitted Nigel. 'The symbols are unfamiliar, and its going to take a lot more time, and it would help if the room stopped swaying from side-to-side…'

'Not going to happen 'til we reach northern Russia,' confirmed Deviega.

'Well, then…it's not going to be easy…but I do have a theory. Firstly, I think these love poems appear to be contemporaneous with the reign of Cleopatra… but the other column is much older. I would date them back to the reign of Thutmose III, Hatshepsut, Ramesses II even, the height of Egyptian power…'

'Yes, yes, very interesting – and irrelevant! What do they mean?'

For the first time since he'd entered the room, Nigel detected an impatient anger brewing on Deviega's countenance. He didn't like the way he was twitching his large, booted feet, either.

'I…well…that's what I'm not sure about, but…honestly, tracing it back to that era will help in translating. It's all about destruction, obviously, but exactly _what_ about it I don't know. But, I have an idea that it's all centred upon the function of the Needle itself, as if it is some sort of weapon…'

Nigel gasped as Deviega's hand clamped down suddenly around his throat.

'You're choking me,' he stuttered, trying in vain to claw the much larger man's grip away with his single free-hand.

'How does it work, Bailey? How does the Needle work?'

'I…I don't know…honestly, I don't! I haven't…even been through all the rubbings yet! And, even if it does say something…uh…surely its just myth?'

'Not good enough, boy! You've got _six hours _– but, don't worry, I'm sure I can think of ways to help you work a little faster!'

He squeezed Nigel's throat even tighter before releasing him suddenly, leaving him gagging for air.

'Do you understand me?'

'Yes,' husked Nigel, his voice sore.

'Get to it then! You know the score – tick tock!'

Then the door slammed and Deviega was gone.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

It was nearly 9 pm and closing time before Sydney and Preston got back to the British library. Nigel's research was still laid out on his desk in the corner of the reading-room. A petite, female librarian was hovering nearby, angry that the documents had been deserted so long.

She confronted Sydney and Preston as they approached. 'Do you know what happened to the gentleman who was studying these documents? They've been unattended now for nearly ten hours!'

'Yes, Nigel Bailey is my assistant,' started Sydney.

'…and my brother,' chipped in Preston.

'I'm afraid he's been, uh, taken ill.'

'Oh!' said the woman. 'Oh, fair enough. I thought it might just have been another tardy student who'd wandered off into the nearest alehouse and forgotten all about the joys of learning! Well, I'd better put the documents away then…'

'No, wait! I need to have a look at what Nigel was reading.'

'I'm afraid it's too late for that. You will have to let me log the documents back into the system and call them up again on your own Readers Ticket tomorrow. I'm sorry.'

Sydney moved swiftly, laying a firm hand on the woman's arm before she could start tidying the papers away. 'You don't understand. My name is Professor Sydney Fox.'

'Oh…_the_ Professor Fox?'

'Yes, _the_ Professor Fox!'

The woman thinned her eyes. 'If this is part of a breathtakingly exciting international relic hunt, and I bend the rules to let you have a peek, do I get my name in the papers at the end?'

'Sure,' gushed Sydney, all but elbowing the woman out of the way as she picked up a grey folder of manuscripts. 'May I?'

'Go ahead,' whispered the woman. 'My name's Daisy Peterssen and I am the Deputy Chief Librarian of the Manuscripts Room. Don't forget me!'

'No…I won't,' muttered Sydney distractedly, her attention already focused on the intricate, handwritten texts.

Preston flashed Daisy a charming smile. 'Thanks Miss Peterssen, this really is awfully decent of you.'

'It's a pleasure,' simpered Daisy. 'Actually, now I think about it, there is something that you might like to know. There was a woman pouring over these papers earlier. Although she had a valid Reader's Card, our security guards became suspicious and they searched her at the door. She didn't take anything, but she was behaving very oddly…'

That grabbed Sydney's attention. 'What was her name?'

'Um, I can't remember, but I can check for you. Ann-Marie something, I think.'

'Ann-Marie!'

'_The_ Ann-Marie?' asked Preston.

'I'm guessing so,' breathed Sydney. 'Uh, Daisy, if she has a Reader's Card, does that mean you have an address for her?'

'Yes, we do. But letting you have it would be absolutely illegal!'

Before Sydney could even remind Daisy of her possible future fame, Preston had seized the librarian's hand, and fixed upon her a pair of surprisingly beguiling blue eyes. 'Miss Peterssen, I know this is a frightful thing to ask of such a young and, may I say, attractive woman, with such a bright, future amidst the bright lights of curatorship...but it would mean so, so much to us…to _me_. I would be both sincerely and eternally grateful!'

Sydney couldn't help marveling at Preston's cheek. Either he was a born flirt, or much cleverer than he seemed – even if he didn't have Nigel's natural ability at such maneuvers. Daisy, now as pink as a rose, gave a girlish titter: 'I'll see what I can do,' she promised, and skipped off in the direction of the nearest staff computer.

'Good work,' whispered Sydney. But she wiped the smug grin straight off Preston's face by shoving a great pile of papers in his hands. 'Now get reading, Bailey!'

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

It was three hours later before Sydney finally let her head sink to the desk in utter despair.

'There's nothing here,' she groaned. 'I've been though excavation notes, letters to his wife, endless receipts for the sale of relics, reams of shipping notices and all I've learnt is that Boris Dostoyevsky was about as honest with his politics as he was with his archeology!

'Yes, I picked that up too,' agreed Preston. 'He went from being an ardent royalist to a devoted Bolshevik at the 1917 Russian Revolution, so it seems… but nothing even _mentions_ Cleopatra's Needle.'

'My point exactly! Whatever breakthrough Nigel made, it's not here anymore.'

'Quite!' Preston rubbed his forehead in frustration. 'Look, we still can't be sure that Nigel's disappearance is related to his research. I mean, if that Bellimo fellow has him, it could _merely_ be an act of revenge. Shouldn't we be going after him?'

Sydney took a deep breath. If this _was_ sheer revenge, there was a strong possibility Nigel was already dead. Her gut, fortunately, was telling her that he _had _been snatched because he was on the verge of discovering something big – but was that just her bland sense of optimism? Whatever it was, she had to cling to that belief.

Sydney glanced down at the scrap of pink paper on which Daisy had scrawled Ann-Marie's address. It was a Chelsea flat, somewhere off the King's Road.

'Let's go see if our friend Ann-Marie is in.'

Preston groaned exhaustedly. 'At this hour?'

'Yeah, at this hour!' snapped Sydney. 'Do you want to find him or don't you?

Smothering a wide yawn, he rose from his chair. 'Okay, Sydney. Let's go to Chelsea.'

**Thanks for reading. Please review.**


	5. Alarm

**Disclaimers: as before.**

**Thanks for those reviews – very much appreciated :)**

**Warnings****: this chapter contains violence (towards Nigel!) For various convoluted reasons, I had a huge guilt trip about it, took it out, then half put it back, took it out, put it back, blamed Nano word-counts, blamed my muse, blamed me, took it out, and finally put it back in an edited form because it was sort of essential to the plot…etc. But anyway, it's there. This chapter also contains a swear word I don't normally use in life or fanfic. No offence intended and you were warned!  
**

CHAPTER FIVE: ALARM

The Chelsea townhouse, in Carlyle Road, was tall, dark and eerily quiet. There was no answer when Sydney buzzed the button on the intercom for flat number 3, where Ann-Marie allegedly resided.

'Well, that's a shame,' said Preston, far too loudly. 'We're going to have to come back tomorrow.'

'No we're not. There could be something inside that flat which helps us find Nigel - and _somebody_ is in!' She pointed to a faint light in a window, high up in the roof of the house. 'See?'

Sydney simultaneously pressed every other button on the intercom – there were ten of them.

'I can't believe you of all people are doing that,' sniffed Preston. 'It's extremely bad manners!'

'Not as bad manners as kicking you in the head is going to be,' murmured Sydney. After an excrutiating wait of nearly two minutes the buzzing stopped and a frail voice came crackling over the intercom.

'Hello?'

'Uh, hello,' said Sydney. 'I've, um, come to distribute some charity envelopes through your doors for the…um, Cat's Protection League?'

Sydney cringed – the CPL had been the first British charity to pop into her head. She said a silent prayer that she was talking to a cat-lover.

'At this hour, dear? It's nearly 11 p.m!'

'Uh, yes, sorry, I do this…um, voluntary charity work after a long day at the office, and it's pretty late by the time I get to the end of my round.'

'Well, okay then, I suppose you'd better come in! Anything for the kitties!'

'Yes, anything for the kitties!' gushed Sydney, as the door buzzed, and then clicked open at a touch. She entered into a tidy, white-painted entrance corridor, which was instantly illuminated by an automatic light.

'Somehow, I never thought you were such a ready liar!' tutted Preston sanctimoniously. He followed her into the lobby and up the stairs, nevertheless.

'Somehow, I _can_ believe how much you are irritating me already,' thought Sydney.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Flat 3 was on the second floor, and had a black panelled front-door with brass-fittings. Sydney knocked briskly. No answer.

'What are we going to do now?' moaned Preston. 'We can't break in - it's bound to be alarmed!'

'Tell me something I don't know,' replied Sydney, and forced the door open with a mighty shoulder shove.

A burglar alarm started blipping instantly. Switching on the light, Sydney rushed to the alarm box and dashed the plastic key-pad off the wall, leaving it dangling from a bunch of multicoloured wires.

'Err, I hope this works!' She yanked a blue wire from the wall. The bleeping continued.

'Damn!' It could only be a matter of seconds before the alarm went off for real.

'Oh, for goodness sake!' cried Preston. He pulled open a fuse-box to the upper-left of the front door and yanked out all the fuses with a dexterous determination. The light blacked out with a clank and, more importantly, the alarm fell silent.

'Thanks…uh, good work!' Sydney looked back at Preston's lanky figure, silhouetted against the light that still shone in from the corridor, which was obviously on a different circuit. 'That doesn't always work with alarms.'

Preston shrugged. 'I thought it was worth a shot! Besides, we can't go after Nigel if we're both in a Chelsea police cell for the night, can we?'

'No, I guess not!' Sydney favoured him with an open-mouthed laugh and pulled a flash-light out of her satchel. 'Now let's see what Ann-Marie was on to – and why she was snooping about Nigel's research this afternoon. My hunch tells me she was doing more than revising a text book!'

Sydney located a second flashlight for Preston in a kitchen cupboard, and they both began rummaging through the flat separately – although with much more respect than had been shown to Nigel's tiny apartment.

Like most in this area of Chelsea, Ann-Marie's flat was a very posh pad where regency glamour met the best of modern living. Spacious, bay-windowed rooms were adorned with classical sculpture, J.W. Turner landscapes, flat-screen TV's and a built-in Bang and Olufson sound system. Preston admired this even as he commented that it wasn't as highly rated as his Sony one.

'This Ann-Marie woman certainly has some hard cash,' he added. 'Even renting, this place would cost over £1500 a week.'

'Which is way beyond the salary of a lowly history-book editor,' added Sydney, pulling out the top drawer of a sturdy, Victorian walnut desk. 'This is _not_ the flat of an academic. I can't even see any books…but then I can't see any personal possessions at all; no family pictures or anything like that.'

The drawer contained plain, white printing paper – with nothing on it. She slammed it shut.

'So, Ann-Marie, who are you?'

Sydney forced open the bottom draw which, unlike the others, was locked. It contained a large pile of newspaper clippings. She shone her torch upon them - then inhaled sharply.

'Preston, look at this! Clippings – and they're all about me and Nigel! That's a picture of us, just after we'd helped bring-down Bellimo. It was taken outside the Old Bailey, following the trial.'

'Hmm, yes,' snorted Preston, noting that the clipping was from _The Telegraph_, his favoured morning rag. 'I remember the story well – it was the first thing _I _heard of the whole caboodle!'

'They kept the case quiet until the trial itself. There was a lot at stake, and Interpol had hoped that Bellimo might do a deal - squeal on a few of his crime-loving buddies, in order to receive a shorter sentence. But he refused to give an inch...' She trailed off as she focussed on the shot of Nigel. He was standing slightly behind her, his hands stuffed in his trouser pockets, looking very uncomfortable. She remembered how nervous he'd been that day – testifying in court about his abduction and treatment had been an understandably traumatic experience, almost as bad as living through the whole thing again.

Her throat contracted with abhorrence: _living through the whole thing again_. That was probably exactly what was happening to him now – or so much worse.

Quashing her emotions as best she could, Sydney shoved the clipping to the back of the pile and continued thumbing through. There were at least a dozen more on the Bellimo case, and then twenty or thirty more about his past crimes, including the theft of art-works by Canova, da Vinci and Caravaggio, some of which concerned their recovery six months ago. Many, however, were dated from the 1980s and 1990s, at the time of the original thefts – at a stage when if was impossible to know that Bellimo was actually behind them.

'Why did she want these?' wondered Sydney out loud. 'And how did she know to collect them at the time?'

'I have no idea,' said Preston. 'What else has she got?'

'Let's find out.' Sydney flicked on further through the clippings until she caught sight of a face that, even when staring at her out of a grainy black-and-white photograph, made her blood run cold.

'Fabrice Deviega!' she growled. 'How the heck did you get mixed up in this, you lowlife?'

The clipping concerned a trial at which Deviega had been acquitted. Sydney had not heard about the case, which had occurred well before she'd found out that Deviega was responsible for the death of Professor Newell. But she was not surprised as she read the details.

It was a murder case. A young Athenian museum curator had been found with her throat brutally cut, and several priceless pieces of gold Mycenaean sculpture had been swiped from her care. Deviega, who looked a little younger and rather dashing in the picture – he was wearing a jaunty neckerchief and his hair was swept back - had got off merely through a good alibi. It had been given by a man named…

'Bellimo!' she growled. 'I don't believe it! Those two have been cohorts all along. If only I'd known!'

Preston, whose knowledge of Sydney's antagonism towards Deviega was only sketchy, scrunched his nose sceptically: 'I don't see what difference it would make.'

'If they're working together now, it makes all the difference,' spat Sydney. 'Deviega makes Bellimo look like a boy scout!'

'Oh…that doesn't bode well for Nigel, does it?'

'No,' was all Sydney could manage. Almost on autopilot, she flicked through to the bottom of the pile. There were more execrable images of Deviega, and more details of the most horrific crimes, most of which he'd got away with.

Then, at the bottom, was something entirely different: a computer print-out of the paper that Nigel had given at Harvard regarding his theories about the survival of Cleopatra's Needle. Paper-clipped to the top was a photograph of Nigel himself, one she had snapped herself with her digital camera to be submitted for the conference perspective.

It had taken been shortly after they'd got back to the States following the Bellimo trial. Nigel was sitting on the desk in her office with the blinds in the back-ground, as he so often did when they discussed relics, future plans, work, life…anything. Well, nearly anything. He was smiling, and it was a genuine smile that glowed excitedly in his eyes. They'd been so happy then – for, oh, about a week! Then Nigel had started asking questions about why it was they mustn't tell anyone about their relationship, and Sydney had suggested it would be better if, on weeknights, they went back to their own apartments. And then they'd gone on that hunt with Grey.

If only it had been easier to talk about love in that office, she ruminated sadly. If only.

She was snapped out of this descent into ambiguous regret when Preston said loudly: 'What _was_ this bloody woman up to? I'm going to have another look around. I saw a laptop in the corner of the drawing room. Hopefully its batteries are charged - I'm going to switch it on and see what I can find.'

'Okay,' murmured Sydney. 'I'll, uh, I'll go look in the bedroom. Maybe she's got something under her mattress.'

'Another squirrel like Podge, you reckon?' chortled Preston, and sauntered off, leaving Sydney marvelling at how he could still maintain a sense of humour, when Nigel could so easily be…

'No!' she told herself firmly. 'You've never thought like that before, Sydney, and you're not going to start now. Nigel is alive, and you're going to find him!'

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Nigel chewed despondently on the corner of one of the soggy pieces of bread. He had taken out the meat inside. Normally he liked the meaty bit of meals, but not this particular filler. It was spam!

Spam, which had been served to him incessantly at boarding school, made him feel ill at the best of times – and right now, with the waves around him building constantly, he thought it might just finish him off.

Still, he forced down the bread because he needed to concentrate on the translation, and that was becoming increasingly difficult. What more was he supposed to get out of this stuff? Paper after paper contained unfamiliar symbols, that spoke of tempest and placed the Needle at the heart of it – but it was hardly the instruction book Deviega was demanding him to find. Only one symbol showed any sort of interaction: it contained the subservient image of the slave, followed by the image that translated as 'to dig', with a little bed of flowers, the reaching hand and the eagle, and finally, the image of the obelisk itself. The next symbols were simply of Earth, Fire and Victory.

Nigel was hardly cheered by this breakthrough. 'I doubt it will be enough to pacify them,' he though miserably. 'But even if I did find anything, what if it really does have some sort of supernatural powers and they get their greedy hands on it? It's more than my life is worth…'

He ran his fingers over tired, strained eyes then turned over to the next page of glyphs. It was then - and the boat lurched up and sideways over a particularly stomach-churning wave - that the single light-bulb flickered and went black, leaving him in total darkness.

'Great!' thought Nigel. 'Just great! And _what,_ exactly, am I supposed to do now?'

Realising his choices were thin, however, Nigel managed to make a small, but positive, breakthrough of his own. Fumbling in the dark he piled his folders and notes on top of each other so they were high enough for him to rest his head upon. Weariness soon overcame him and he drifted off into an uneasy slumber.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Nigel woke abruptly when the pile of folders was snatched away from under his head. He cried out confusedly as his weight cracked upwards onto his chained wrist. This didn't stop somebody from throwing a bucket of water over him.

'You should know better to slack at a time like this, Bailey. I though you were a good boy.'

Nigel, who recognised the voice as Bellimo's, struggled to sit up and wipe the water from his eyes with his free hand - only to screw them tight shut again. Somebody was shining a flashlight into his face; from the shuffle of feet and the indeterminable murmur of voices, Nigel could sense there were several other men in the room.

He couldn't see any of them. But they could all see him.

'The…the light went out,' he croaked. 'I…I couldn't see to read!'

'Well, it's on again now,' snarled another voice, Deviega he was sure. 'What've you got for us?'

Nigel stalled, trying to assess the situation. He could vaguely make out four figures in the gloom. They all looked enormous, towering over him, and his inability to tell who was who made them seem all the more threatening. He was beyond scared, his emotions were almost numb, and he realised, with only vague embarrassment, that he was starting to shiver violently. The water had been freezing - and he'd already been cold before.

'We're waiting.'

'I…I didn't find much…honest.'

'Not good enough.'

Nigel recoiled in terror, trying to curl himself into a ball, as one of the men loomed down at him out of the darkness. He only got a fragmentary glance and the pasty, grinning face, but he knew it was Bately. He lashed out, striking hard into the man's sturdy body with his elbow the instant he felt his hands upon him; in return Bately backhanded him across the cheek, temporarily stunning him. Then he ripped off Nigel's sodden shirt.

'Get your hands off me,' yelled Nigel, half-wishing he _would_ pass out. But Bately had already backed into the darkness. All he could see again was the four, cloudy shapes; he could taste blood in his mouth.

'We're waiting,' came the ominous voice again. 'This is your last chance, Bailey.'

Nigel nodded, his breath shaky. 'Okay…I…I think you're right that the Needle is some sort of weapon…'

Before Nigel could even finish talking, the blow came from nowhere. Some sort of black strap lashed across his chest, stinging but stopping short of drawing blood. Nigel instinctively turned and the next stike hit his back just below the shoulders.

'I…I don't know…what you want!' he pleaded. 'They're unfamiliar symbols…they're incomplete…I'm doing the best I can!'

He cried out and buried his face in the cool, steel pipe as the third strike came. 'Nnng! What the hell _more_ can I do?'

He discerned somebody leaning close over him, then their voice rasped odiously in his ear: 'We want the formula, Bailey. Give us the formula or you die.'

Nigel ventured a glance back. Deviega's reddened, sagging visage filled his vision, his green eyes glowing with vitriolic intent.

He swallowed hard before he spoke: 'I…I didn't find anything, honestly, but I still haven't finished. Just…just give me another chance. The Ancient Egyptian's were adept chemists. If it's there…I'll…I'll do my best to translate it.'

'What a coward,' thought Nigel, letting his head flop down into the crook of his arm. 'Sydney would despise me – if she doesn't already!'

'He's holding back,' said Bellimo, as Deviega backed away. The strap snapped across his back again, and black dots began to dance in front of his eyes.

'Tell us what you know!'

Nigel's willpower sagged with his last reserves of resistance and energy. 'St Petersburg!' he cried, this time his voice racked with smothered sobs. 'That's all I knew about – the Needle was shipped to St. Petersburg in 1915! Please…you have to believe me. It's all I ever found out about it.'

He braced himself for another blow, but it didn't come – not yet.

'So you _were_ holding back.' Deviega's voice was eerily calm. 'It's a shame – I thought better of you.'

'The information is useless to us anyway,' said Bellimo, his muffled tone indicating the words were meant for his partners in crime. 'We know where the Needle was at a later date than that, so if he can't give us the formula that Lenin was after we might as well ditch him.'

'I…I will be able to…just give me another chance.'

Every sinew in Nigel's body tensed as he heard the lash swipe through the air again; but it never hit home. Prying one eye open, he saw an assured fist had caught the wrist of Bellimo, who had been swinging the whip. Steely muscles swelled and tautened as a powerful, bare arm held the vicious weapon away from Nigel's vulnerable flesh.

The fourth man. He'd been silent so far, and stayed hidden behind the others, his face never flickering out of the gloom.

'This isn't working Bellimo. The man still knows more than he's letting one. Leave him to me – I'll get that formula out of him.'

The voice was gruff and American-accented. Even though Nigel's consciousness was increasingly vague, he knew that voice and exactly to whom it belonged. But he daren't believe in it. His body slumped towards the floor: 'This is a nightmare! My mind's playing tricks on me.'

'Yeah, by what means?' whined Batley. 'This isn't fair. If he's no more use he was promised to me.'

The fourth man dropped Bellimo's arm; Nigel heard a scuffle, and Bellimo was shoved backwards. Bately gasped as a seismically powerful hold was taken around his throat.

'You keep your fucking hands off him! You hear me?' Then, almost as an afterthought, the 'fourth man' added, 'Bailey's mine until he speaks. It's one of the things I came on board for, remember?'

There was a loaded silence. Nigel tried to concentrate on his breathing; it was stuttering and shallow and he was just _so _cold. It was getting harder and harder to understand what was happening to him

'Yeah, back off Bately,' barked Deviega after a moment. 'Let Watson do his job. There are enough amateurs on this ship – you can control your sordid urges just a little longer, huh?'

He gave a mocking laugh; somebody patted somebody else's back. Bately swore and slouched from the room.

Now Nigel was sure he was delirious. 'Watson,' he murmured to himself, 'Watson…Watson…it can't be…'

'I need space, guys,' came the familiar voice again, now slightly impatient. A few more words were quickly exchanged and then Bellimo and Deviega were hurried from the room.

'Watson…Richard Watson,' Nigel was gasping as the door slammed. 'Richard Watson is…Derek Lloyd!'

The flashlight crashed to the floor, its rays still shed upon Nigel. A heartbeat later, the impossibly strong hand clamped down over his own mouth. He struggled intuitively, and let out a muffled cry, even as his strength gave out and he slumped back against a well-toned chest covered in a thin t-shirt.

Derek's unmistakable, handsome face swung into view above him. Nigel tried to say his name, but the hand over his mouth only tightened.

'Now listen up, Nigel, and listen good! I'm going to do my best to help you, to get you out of here – but, if you blow my cover, then we're _both_ dead men. Understand?'

Nigel gave an almost indiscernible nod and Derek loosened his hold, but only a little.

'Okay then. Let's start by exchanging some 'need-to-knows.' How the heck did you get here? I had no idea it was you they had….Nigel….Nigel? Oh shit.'

Derek broke off as finally he removed his hand and Nigel's head lolled back against his shoulder. His friend had finally passed out.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Preston switched on the lap-top and watched it load up until the Windows 2000 screen flashed out of the blackness; then it came to the log-in screen.

'Damn it! The bloody thing's pass-worded!' he called. 'Any idea how you crack these blighters?'

Sydney didn't answer, so he clicked madly on the username icon and pressed the enter key, just in case it hadn't been set. Nothing happened so he started tapping in some of his own passwords that he thought might have universal resonance: 'kylie', 'annakournakova', 'hmthequeen'! He was so embroiled in his amateur attempts at hacking he never even sensed the woman creep into the room and aim the gun at the back of his head.

'Sydney?' he called again. 'Did you hear me? I can't get in! Useless modern technology – oh!!'

Preston jumped at the sound of a thump and a startled cry. Sydney, emerging apparently from nowhere, had dashed the gun from the woman's hand with a deft high-kick. She was now embroiled in a wrangling match on the floor, grappling and rolling about with a woman slightly taller than her, but even more slender in build.

The elder Bailey brother wasn't quite sure how to intervene, so he didn't. He stood with his hands slightly raised, much in the style of an arachnophobic who'd just seen a very large spider. Sydney was winning, of course: the woman had failed to get the gun back and now the Relic Hunter was on top of her, pinning her arms above her head.

'Sydney Fox!' cried the woman, apparently surprised.

'Ann-Marie,' snarled Sydney. 'Come on then, spit it out! Who are you and why have you got a draw-full of pictures of some of the ugliest bastards out there – and Nigel.'

'He's not so ugly,' agreed Ann-Marie, with a thin, half-smile. 'Well, Professor Fox, if you'd please get off of me I'll explain.'

'Explain now! And why were you snooping around Nigel's stuff earlier – do you know where he is?'

'It would be much easier if you'd led me show you!' With some skill that spoke of training if not talent in self-defence, Ann-Marie destabilised Sydney with a thrust of her knees, and yanked away her hands. Sitting up, she regarded Preston sceptically - he had finally located the gun and had it shakily trained upon her. Then she pulled a small plastic wallet from her top pocket and handed it to Sydney.

'Ann-Marie Gregory, On Her Majesties Secret Service,' read Sydney out-loud, as she scrutinised the authenticity of the crown-insignia. It looked good enough. 'You work for MI6! Why the heck didn't you tell me before?'

'You didn't give me a chance!' protested Ann-Marie, who was now standing up and brushing down a smart, grey two piece skirt-suit. 'I've never seen this gentleman before and though I was dealing with an intruder in my flat.'

'I meant before, back in the States!' growled Sydney. 'You said you were researching for a book.'

'It wasn't necessary for me to pass on any information at that time,' replied Ann-Marie plainly. 'But I'm afraid it is now. Nigel has been kidnapped.'

'Tell me something I don't know! Who's got him? Is it Bellimo? Deviega?'

Ann-Marie's lips tightened further: 'First tell me who he is?' she asked, pointing at Preston.

'Oh, sorry!' Feeling rude, despite the circumstances, Preston offered his hand to Ann-Marie. 'Preston Bailey. I'm Nigel's elder brother.'

Ann-Marie accepted the handshake coldly. 'I'm sorry Mr. Bailey. But I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to leave the premises. I have done suitable background checks to ensure that Professor Fox will be an asset to my investigation. About you, I know nothing.'

Sydney gestured to the door with her head. 'Can you wait outside?'

'Well, if I must!' Preston slapped the gun down on the desk and stomped indignantly from the room, shutting the door behind him.

The next second, Sydney turned on Ann-Marie furiously: 'Who's got Nigel? And what is this all about?'

'Everything I say is classified and you must not repeat it under any circumstances.'

Sydney's fists curled at her side. 'Just tell me, or I swear I'll…'

'Alright, Professor Fox, please keep calm. Bellimo and Deviega have worked together for years – and, yes, they've got Nigel. But this isn't just about revenge – this is much bigger than that.'

'You mean it's about finding Cleopatra's Needle?'

Ann-Marie nodded grimly. 'Yes; this is about the Needle - or, as it was labelled by Vladimir Lenin himself, Secret Weapons Development Project, Number 142. And, believe me, we have to find it before Deviega does, or the consequences could be unthinkable.'

**Thanks for Reading. Please Review.**


	6. Undercover

**Disclaimers: as before.**

**A big thanks for those reviews and a big, big thanks to Tanya Reed and Aryea for their helpful comments on parts of this chapter :)**

CHAPTER SIX: UNDERCOVER

'_Secret Weapons Development Project, Number 142_? _Vladimir Lenin?' _Sydney fixed Ann-Marie with a steely glare that demanded information. 'What the heck are you talking about?'

The MI6 agent reached into her jacket pocket, pulled out two photographs and began to speak very quietly and quickly. 'Last month, one of our agents infiltrated a house in Tavistock, Devon, that he believed was being used by a member of the FBI's most wanted list - Fabrice Deviega. The agent, a friend of mine, was found floating in the River Tamar last week, a dagger embedded in his back. Before he was liquidated, however, he beamed back these pictures.'

She handed the first of the shots to Sydney. It was a hand-typed letter, written in Russian. Unfortunately, it was obviously taken in a great hurry and so badly framed that no date or signature could be seen.

'We believe this a document from the early years of the Bolshevik regime – one of a set of papers recently stolen from Moscow and for the disappearance of which the Russian Government has blamed British and U.S. spies. This small fragment reveals that the Needle was not only in Bolshevik hands at some stage, but that it was also allegedly made of some sort of highly explosive compound that reacts exothermically on contact with…well, we don't know what yet. But Cleopatra's Needle, you see, was not _just _a historical relic!'

'They never are!' returned Sydney. 'But that's not the point. If you _knew_ Nigel was messing with something dangerous, why didn't you warn him – or me?'

'The risk seemed low – until the Dartmoor jail-break.' Ann-Marie offered a glimmer of an apologetic smile. 'Then things moved just a little too fast.'

But Sydney was far from convinced. 'You called me in the States nearly twelve hours before Nigel was abducted and let me know something was up. _He _was right here, in London. Even if you didn't have his address, you obviously knew he was at the library. Looks to me like you had all the time in the world – and you didn't take it.'

'I didn't know things were coming to a head so quickly,' conceded Ann-Marie, running her fingers anxiously through her hair, which was scraped back into a bun. 'We were hoping that keeping Nigel…exposed a little longer might lead to a breakthrough.'

'You mean you used him as bait?'

Sydney's eyes flamed with such anger that Ann-Marie quickly handed her the second shot, which turned out to be of the cover sheet of Nigel's Harvard paper, then recoiled a couple of steps, scared she was about to be thumped.

'I…I knew they were watching him…but…but this affair is bigger than _any _individual. Diplomatic relations between Westminster and the Russian Federation are already on shaky ground. Accusations are flying that could culminate in a serious international diplomatic incident. If we could have nailed the evidence that it wasn't us…'

'Sod Diplomacy!' The exclamation was Preston's as he burst abruptly through the door, unwittingly saving Ann-Marie from a timely throttling at Sydney's hands. 'I can't believe you were using my brother in such a way! It would be outrageous even if he hadn't been snatched - taking advantage of a British Citizen like that!' His hand was already in his jacket pocket, and pulling out his mobile. 'I'm calling my lawyer!'

'No!' shouted Sydney and Ann-Marie as one.

'Why not?' Preston regarded Sydney breathlessly. 'You agree this is a travesty?'

'Yeah…but calling lawyers, journalists - whoever – isn't going to help Nigel now.' Sydney was still piercing the MI6 woman with a stare sharper than daggers. 'If you are who you say you are, you screwed up big-time. But you're going to make up for that by helping me get Nigel back!'

Ann-Marie heaved what appeared to be a genuinely regretful sigh. 'Okay. I'm sorry about what's happened, Professor Fox, and I promise to help you find Nigel. Mr Bailey better come along as well, if just to ensure this all stays out of the public domain. Remember, its Nigel who will suffer first from any leak of information.'

'Okay,' husked Sydney, her anger still simmering. 'Let's get back to what matters then: Nigel's theory was that the Needle left Russia after it was excavated in 1915…' She paused, processing the new information in the context of Nigel's picture of the Russian Tsar, but decided not to mention that to Ann-Marie just yet. Instead, she simply said '…and it looks like he was right.'

'Yes,' agreed Ann-Marie. 'And this paper shows it was in the hands of Bolsheviks, but the likelihood is that they simply never worked out how it functioned.'

'No…they would have used it if they did,' murmured Sydney. 'But they didn't – at least, not as far as we know.'

Preston was scratching his head confusedly: 'I'm not following this. I still don't understand quite how Podge…I mean, Nigel, fits in. If these chaps already had these Russian papers as a lead, what can he add?'

Sydney rolled her eyes – Preston could really be dense sometimes. 'Its obvious, isn't it? Not only was he investigating the Needle himself, the key to the Egyptian technology is probably hidden somewhere in one of the most difficult, coded languages of all time - hieroglyphs! Nobody is better at making sense of the archaic and unknown ones than Nigel – and he's been making a bit of a reputation for himself in the academic world lately.'

'Quite,' said Ann-Marie, rather too contritely for Sydney's liking. She started towards the bedroom.

'Where are you going?' demanded Sydney. 'We still have no proper lead on where Nigel is? Have you _nothing _more you can tell us?'

'Nigel is probably in Russia by now,' called Ann-Marie. 'Or at least halfway there. I'm packing my case because the next flight to Moscow leaves Heathrow in three-and-a-half-hours. If you two want to come with me, I suggest you make haste.'

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

'I don't trust that woman,' scowled Sydney, as the cab pulled away from the Chelsea block. They had arranged to meet Ann-Marie on the flight, and decided they had just enough time to stop by the Bailey house on the way, and pick up Preston's suitcase.

'Me neither,' agreed Preston. 'As far-fetched as I find this whole 'weapon' thing, I can't believe she exploited Nigel like that – it's disgusting! If he had been safe at home with me, none of this would have ever happened.'

Sydney shot him a withering side-ways glance. 'If memory serves, he was practically 'with you' when he was taken! And you hardly 'kept an eye on him' like I asked. I mean, what happened? Did you two argue – and did Nigel run out? I though it was weird he had left his phone behind.' She could picture the scene even before Preston started his blustering response.

'Well…sort of. But it really wasn't my fault! I was just trying to be friendly, brotherly even. And he over-reacted - as always.'

'Yeah? To what, huh?'

This time it was Preston who cast the questioning look: '_We _were getting along just fine, but then I started to ask about how things were between you and him. It seems I hit upon a sore point.'

'Oh.'

Sydney couldn't help thinking: 'So was it my fault that Nigel ran out of the library before I could warn him?' But she dismissed the notion quickly. It just didn't help.

Still, she found herself sinking gloomily back against the worn, taxicab seat, her fingers hooking through her hair.

She could picture Nigel now, emerging at the opened door of her office back at Trinity, his recently shortened hair brushed back neatly so that only a couple of strands escaped down over his forehead. There was a warm, wool jacket over his arm and a suitcase in his hand.

'Good-bye then,' he had said, offering her an endearing lop-sided smile. 'I hope the hunts go well.'

She had risen from her chair and had her thrown arms around him in an instant; she remembered so well the softness of his hair against her face. 'Oh Nigel! I'll miss you.'

'I'll miss you too, Syd,' he'd whispered. She sensed the emotion in his voice, but doubted now that she'd favoured him with the same. It had all been bottled too deep inside.

'Just think, in three months, you'll practically be Doctor Bailey.' She pulled away and kissed him on the cheek. 'It'll be great. And when you get back…we'll…we'll talk.'

Nigel had nodded silently, and returned the kiss – it had been a hasty embarrassed one, although his lips still felt moist and tender against her rouged cheek. It was far from the best he was capable of – but nice, all the same.

'Goodbye, Nigel,' she smiled as he turned silently and left the room. Half of her had been screaming to run to the door, call after him, pull him back to her and demand that he kissed her until she died.

'No. I need some space,' she had told herself, and stood there like a Victorian school ma'am, arms folded and lips parted slightly, her spectacles perched on the end of her nose. She let him go.

Karen, eyes reddened with tears, had shuffled a pile of papers angrily then began tapping away so hard at her computer keyboard Sydney wouldn't have been surprised if the plastic had shattered like bullet-ridden glass. She knew Karen was furious with her. Why wouldn't she be? They hadn't told her anything of their affair in London, but she knew all the same. As far as the secretary could see, her boss had been given everything she had ever wanted - and then treated the object of her affection as just another notch on her bedpost.

'So I treated him like shit?'

Back in the taxicab, the notion bored into Sydney's conscience harder that ever. But then, it was so easy to think of Nigel as an angel right now, the little innocent lamb that the world had set upon like so many ravenous wolves – herself included. At least as far as their relationship had been concerned, however, the reality had been rather different. Some of the accusations he'd made had been little short of cruel:

_'You slept with Grey again, didn't you?'_

'_Let me get this straight…so the only reason you wanted to keep things quiet about us was so you could continue sleeping around?'_

Sydney started suddenly at an unexpected, feather-light touch of fingertips on her thigh. She turned to meet two blue eyes brim-full of beguiling sincerity. 'What happened, Sydney? Nigel was obviously upset about what happened between you …but, I do understand. What you did, I mean…it was a mistake, and we all make them.'

'What are you on about?' she snapped. Of course, she knew damn well, but she just didn't want to go there, at least not with _him_.

'I mean that…you probably did the right thing,' continued Preston, 'nipping it all in the bud.' His hand was still above her knee, twitching nervously – or was that an attempt to stroke her leg? 'Nigel's a little young for you…emotionally, more than anything. And…and…I'm not saying that you don't need or want a man but um, a beautiful, independent woman like you, needs somebody with a little more experience, a chap who's rather more level headed…'

Yes! He was definitely stroking her leg now. And was he really leaning over towards her, as if he had the right to…to…

As Sydney swiped away his hand she barely repressed a laugh. 'Uh, I'm not sure what you're trying to get at Preston. But whatever it is, you're barking up one heck of the wrong tree. Wrong forest even, on the wrong continent!'

Preston backed into the corner of the seat like a scolded puppy. 'Um…I'm not trying to 'get' at anything. I just wanted to make you realise that I…I…understand. What you did. And I don't blame you.'

'Lucky you, because _I_ do!' muttered Sydney, as the cab ground to a halt again. 'Look, this is your place isn't it? You'd better go get your stuff – and be quick about it!'

Preston hopped out of the car, suddenly feeling exceedingly grateful for the reprieve. 'Okay, I'll be right back.' He dashed up to the front door, fumbling for the keys.

'You'd better be, Preston Bailey,' mumbled Sydney to herself. 'Because I'm more than slightly tempted to go on without you, you smarmy creep.'

But some sort of irritating hunch made her wait for him, nevertheless.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Nigel woke up as the whole boat heaved sideways, propelled nearly forty-five degrees by the tumultuous north-Atlantic swell. He still felt terrible; of course he did – but as he orientated himself, blinking into the low-lit cabin, and registered he was lying in a relatively comfortable bunk, he also felt better.

Not two feet away from him, sitting on a three-legged wooden stall, was Derek Lloyd. The American agent, still dressed in a sleeveless shirt despite the plummeting temperatures, was staring at a page of Nigel's ring-bound notes, his face etched with a dumfounded confusion. Nigel couldn't prevent a little smile from flickering across his lips. This had to be the first time in the best part of twenty-four hours his situation hadn't got progressively worse!

Nigel eased himself up onto one elbow slowly and opened his mouth to speak. However, Derek had spotted him with the first judder of real movement and his usual, placid expression had returned. He slammed the notes shut and rose to his feet.

'Hey old buddy, how you doing?' he asked, his tone friendly but hushed.

'Apart from having had the crap beaten out of me earlier and feeling like hell?'

Derek chuckled, gently patting Nigel on the shoulder. 'Yeah, apart from that!'

'Oh, just peachy!' Nigel gave a grimacing smile. 'I never thought I'd say this Derek, but I genuinely am _very_ pleased to see you!'

Derek didn't laugh; in fact the chummy glint in his eyes faded quickly.

'Can't say the feeling's mutual, Nigel. You've landed me in one hell of a situation. We've got to tread very carefully from now on, or you're going to get us both killed.'

Nigel frowned, slightly indignant. 'Me? It's not like I asked to be brought here!'

'I'm not saying you did. But you are here, and you're an untrained civilian who's compromising the security of my position.'

'So sorry to have inconvenienced you!' Nigel flopped back down onto the pillow. 'If I may be so bold as to enquire, what _is _your position here?'

Derek scraped the three-legged stool over so his face was mere inches from Nigel's and peered at him intently. He looked so serious that Nigel's fear began to grow again.

'Please don't say this is 'need to know'! What's going on? This is about the Needle being a weapon isn't it?'

To Nigel's surprise, Derek didn't hold back: 'I'm undercover for the United States Secret Service. I'm posing as a double agent under my old name, Richard Watson, offering no-questions-asked links to US arms firm who'll want to do business with Bellimo once he's uncovered the weapons technology he's after.' His voice faded even lower: 'Of course, I'm really here to make sure it never gets that far.'

'Oh,' nodded Nigel, 'I see.'

'No you don't. I thought I'd been able to get Bellimo and Deviega to trust me but I had no idea you were here. It was only chance that I made it to your little interview earlier.'

Nigel flinched just at the memory: 'Well, I'm glad you did, although it wasn't exactly tea and sympathy! Thanks, though - thanks for intervening.'

'I didn't have much choice. Jesus, Nigel!' He switched suddenly to a surprisingly accurate, but mocking, English accent: "It was in St. Petersburg? 'Give me time and I'll tell you what you want?'' Reverting to his own US twang, he stated: 'You were starting to squeal!'

'I'm sorry,' mumbled Nigel. 'But I didn't think I was saying anything that important…and they were hitting me…in fact…in fact, they were threatening to kill me!'

'Not good enough. It's not your fault, you're no professional - but it's just not good enough.'

Nigel was becoming more incredulous by the second: 'I can't believe I'm hearing this! Are you saying that you didn't intervene to help me, but to stop me…err, what did you say, um, _squealing_?'

'That's exactly why I did it - and keep your voice down or your going straight back down in the hold!'

Nigel's disbelief hardened into an angry pout, meeting Derek's steely, unwavering stare. But it was the subtle emotion burning deep in the agent's eyes that caused Nigel to lower his gaze.

'I thought we were friends Derek,' he said quietly.

'Yeah. That's the problem.'

Nigel shut his eyes, pushing his head back into the shallow pillow and half-wishing the bunk would simply swallow him up. He wasn't stupid – he could see Derek's perspective. With this much at stake, it would be easier to simply take him out of the equation.

It would be best to kill him. But Derek couldn't do that. He wouldn't…would he?

He started as he felt Derek's hand squeeze his arm through the bedcover.

'Hey,' he started in a low gruff voice. 'Let's take this one step at a time, okay?'

He lifted Nigel's pile of folders and notes onto the bunk. 'Do you feel well enough to carry on with this?'

'No,' mumbled Nigel. 'But I will, if that's what you think is best. I thought you wouldn't want me to find out any more, in case I squeal!' He silently cursed himself for sounding like a stroppy schoolboy.

Derek didn't take offence. 'You won't. You need to come up with an authentic sounding but _fake _solution – something to buy us time and make it look like I've been doing my job.'

'You mean, make it look like you spent a suitable amount of time knocking the stuffing out of me?'

Nigel's lips twitched into a tense laugh and Derek couldn't resist the temptation to join him. 'Yeah. But that doesn't mean you don't look for the _real _solution. I need to know how it works, okay?'

'You do?'

'Yeah.'

'And why, may I ask? I though you were supposed to be making sure this weapon's never unleashed?'

Derek, appearing not to hear, tapped his chunky wristwatch. 'I've got to go.'

He gestured at an open shoebox and some cans piled beside the bunk, then barked out his instructions like bullet points: 'There's food down there, and the toilet cubicle's in the corner. I'm going to lock you in. You will be safe if you don't draw attention to yourself.'

Nigel pushed himself up again. 'Where are you going? And why do I need to translate…'

He trailed off as Derek shot him a look that virulently demanded silence, and slipped from the room.

**Thanks for reading. Please Review.**


	7. Lost

**Thanks for those reviews. Really, really appreciated! Shivani - that's one of the first times I think anyone has asked me to write longer chapters...it made me smile and I'll do my best to oblige :)**

**Warnings****: hmmm, where do I begin. This chapter contains discussion of m/m relationships, non-con sexual situations, and mild substance abuse. Nothing explicit, but adult themes basically. Plus, some offensive language related to this! Also contains flashbacks to 'missing scenes' from the episode 'Legend of the Lost.'**

**Big thanks again to Aryea and Tanya Reed for comments on this chapter :)**

CHAPTER SEVEN: LOST

'Marvellous!' thought Nigel sardonically. 'So now I'm both prisoner of that bastard Bellimo _and _the US government – and my life is cheap to both, so it seems!'

Dwelling on irony, he found, was far easier than dissecting quite just how angry and upset he was - or admitting that, deep inside, Derek's admissions hurt the most because he knew that they weren't really true.

The Derek Lloyd he knew couldn't have stood there and watched him die. He trusted his friend more that to believe him capable of it, even when implied by his own lips. He also understood that this was easier - between guys - than to admit he'd willingly bent every rule in the book to save him. Besides, as he'd despondently realised before, Derek was right. He _was _a liability.

As for the agent's demand that he should translate the text anyway, he didn't quite know _what _to make of that - but decided he should plough ahead all the same.

Nevertheless, he still felt very shaky and he sure as hell was thirsty. Gingerly, he eased himself down from his bunk. Nigel's legs gave way beneath him almost instantly. Even after grabbing the bunk to steady himself he found himself kneeling, his head bowed forward, in front of the shoe-box.

It contained supplies that Derek had apparently grabbed in a hurry from a kitchen and medical cupboard. There was the obligatory bottle of water, a bruised apple, some sort of chunky meat-pie that hardly appealed at that moment, a couple of bottles of pills and a six-pack of cheap lager.

As much as he would have loved to drown his miseries in alcohol, Nigel realised this would be far from helpful to anyone. The apple, however, was another thing. He took a large, hungry bite, washed it down with a swig of water, and then reached for the bottle of pills.

The first contained ordinary white Paracetamol tablets, but there were only two left in the bottom. 'Not bloody strong enough,' muttered Nigel.

The second bottle, which was nearly full to the top, contained Ibuprofen. There were no instructions on dosage but, recalling the amounts he'd been prescribed when he broke his ankle, Nigel decided he couldn't do too much harm by taking six…or was it four?

Whatever. It couldn't make much difference. He poured out six into his hand, and swigged them down.

Then he hauled himself up onto his bunk and lay down again. Supporting his notes and the rubbings on his knees, which he hitched up in front of him, he took a bite of his apple and began to read.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Derek was gone for some time and, after a while, Nigel began to get worried about him. Where had he gone? Who was he talking to? What if they'd found out he was an undercover agent, and were now holding him prisoner too – who would save them both? Sydney?

Sydney. It was so easy to think of Sydney as being there to save him from anything – so much so that, in the shock of the moments when he'd first been kidnapped, he'd all but forgotten how drastically things had changed between them lately. Even if she did know where he was – which he severely doubted – would she even _want _to come?

'Of course she would,' he muttered to himself. But thinking about her when he was in trouble wasn't the easy balm it had once been.

Nigel tried to concentrate on the hieroglyphs, but found it increasingly difficult. If was supposed to be looking for some sort of formula, it simply wasn't in the samples he'd been giving. This was hopeless!

Nigel pushed aside the notes, climbed down from the bunk, and stumbled into the tiny bathroom. Catching sight of himself in a cracked mirror, he couldn't help but groan. He was a mess, pale and peeky to say the least, and his hair was all over the place! Evidently, he was also wearing Derek's clothes: a plain black T-shirt, some navy blue training pants, and dark green socks, which he was pretty sure must be army issue.

'Bit of a give-away?' he wondered. The outfit was not a bad fit, but slightly baggy and certainly not 'him.'

Nigel washed, and even took the liberty of using Derek's razor. However, as the painkillers kicked in, he felt increasingly angry.

Why did that bastard think he could speak to him like that? But then Derek Lloyd had always treated him like shit – like some pawn in a chess game, useful only to compel Sydney to do something for him.

Then he caught sight of the lager, still by the shoe-box on the floor.

'What the hell!'

Nigel grabbed a can, slouched back down onto the bunk. He propped up the uselessly flat pillow, leant back and took a large swig.

'Eeeeeeugh!'

It didn't taste great; more tart than bitter, but it was something – and he needed that something right now. Combined with the effects of the pills it soon made Nigel forget his pressing research – while letting everything else in his consciousness loom increasingly and hauntingly large.

_'Bloody Derek…bloody Derek…'_

_Had it really been nearly three years ago that Derek had knocked him off his bike and transported him, against his will, to New Guinea? His predominant memories of the early part of that mission were of feeling about as fantastic as he did now…_

_'Oh…God, where am I?'_

_Silence. Nigel opened one eye – he was on a plane, or so he thought. The back of one of those horrific cargo plans that one always feared one was going to have to jump out of in the style of Indiana Jones!_

_Sitting on the floor a few metres off was a stocky-built, familiar looking man, fiddling with a sizable, black Beretta handgun._

_'Derek Lloyd! Was that…did you…ow, my head!'_

_Derek's eyes snapped onto Nigel with a crack of his neck the very instant the younger man sat up. The agent's countenance was disarmingly blank._

_Reaching up to feel the bandaging on his forehead, Nigel gawped back and wondered quite how scared he should be. Surely Derek Lloyd was a good guy? Yeah, maybe he was only good in a lying, cheating forcing-people-to-do-what-he-wanted, trigger-happy kind of way…but he was a good guy! Wasn't he?_

_'Uh…Derek, um, what is this all about? Who…who knocked me off my bike? And where are we?'_

_Derek stood up suddenly and began pacing over, all the while tapping the flat of the gun menacingly into the palm of his hand. Nigel instinctively shuffled back a little and pulled up the blanket that covered him, his apprehension growing._

_'Um…obviously, this about Sydney, so…?'_

_Now towering over him, Derek's expressionless face suddenly exploded into a dry laugh. 'Yeah, this is about Sydney. Enough said?'_

_'Uh…not really.' Nigel frowned, pursing his lips. 'If you want Sydney, why am I here? I mean, the first time we went on a mission together, if I recall, you thought so highly of my abilities she had to force your hand just so I could come along.'_

_'Times change, tactics change. If I don't change tactics, I die.'_

_'Yes, and your tactics could have killed me!'_

_'That was only a minor possibility. It was worth the risk.'_

_If it hadn't been hurting so much, Nigel would have shaken his head in wordless disgust. 'You're despicable!'_

_'And you use too many long words!' barked Derek. 'So I suggest you shut up and get some rest. We're going to be landing in approximately thirty minutes.'_

_'Landing? Where?'_

_'New Guinea. Then all you have to do is keep quiet and sit tight - and I'll summon the lovely Professor to come and sort out a little issue for me in the National Reserve.'_

_For this first time, Nigel experienced a spark of real annoyance: 'So that's what this is all about! I'm simply here as bait?'_

_'That's exactly it.' Nigel winced as Derek smashed the Beretta particularly aggressively into his hand. 'And unless you want a matching pair of those bruises on your face, I suggest you quit your whining!'_

_So Nigel had behaved - even as he grew more and more furious inside. Not that he had much choice. Derek was a consummate professional, and never took his trained eyes off him for a second._

_With anybody else, Nigel might have tried to grab an empty wooded crate as he climbed down from the plane and broken it over their head. He might have even attempted a surreptitious kick in the teeth as his captor offered him a hand down from the plane – something Nigel found intensely patronising. But, with Derek, he knew he'd never make it. There wasn't even a chance to run as they crossed the airstrip to the awaiting jeep. Indeed, Derek enclosed his hand domineeringly around Nigel's upper arm, sort of guiding him forward and precluding this possibility – and making Nigel's heckles rise to new heights._

_Then he had shoved him in the back of the jeep, pulled those insufferable shades from his top-pocket and barked instruction to the driver._

_Nigel couldn't contain himself any longer: 'Didn't your mother ever teach you to say please or thank you?'_

_'Yes she did,' said Derek plainly. 'She was a very polite woman. No doubt she said please to the street-robber that killed her. I doubt he said thank you.'_

_'Oh…I'm…oh…sorry.'_

_After that, there wasn't much left to say._

_IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII_

_Derek pushed Nigel through the door of the motel room. He then grabbed a wooden chair and dumped it in the middle of the room in front of a big, double bed swathed in mosquito nets._

_'Sit there!'_

_Nigel obeyed, although not without shooting his captor a surly glare. This was intolerable! The moment he got out of here he was going to make a phone-call straight to the British Embassy and stir up the biggest diplomatic incident since the Cuban missile crisis! Even a kick in the head from Sydney was not going to be enough punishment for this sort of treatment._

_On top of this, he was just so stiflingly, uncomfortable hot. The sweat was pouring down his back, soaking his shirt, and trickling down his forehead in such a torrent he had to wipe it from his eyes._

_Derek, meanwhile, was behaving in the inexplicably fashion that Nigel had come to expect. The Special Agent had shut the door and locked it, and was now shaking the whole portal. Then he bent down and rattled the lock._

_He grunted, then went over to the window and repeated the same ritual._

_'Not good enough.'_

_Derek slung his pack down onto the floor. Nigel peeped over his shoulder to see what he was doing - and, to his disgust, noticed he was pulling out a long, thick strip of rope._

_Before he knew what was happening, Derek had yanked both of Nigel's arms behind his back. The next, he had looped the coarse length of rope tight around them._

_'Excuse me!' protested Nigel. 'This…uh, this really isn't necessary.'_

_'Yes is it. A child could break the locks on that window and door.'_

_Nigel repressed his intense irritation at this last comment even as Derek pulled tight the threads around his wrists, but only because he had another point to make: 'Why would I escape? I mean, I'm in the middle of nowhere - where would I go?'_

_'Straight to the nearest telephone booth to call Sydney Fox. Or the maybe the British Embassy. I can't let you do that.'_

_Nigel grimaced. Was he really that transparent?_

_Derek had now taken a step back, and pulled his Beretta out of its halter and checked the guard was on. Nigel inhaled sharply – there was a glint in Derek's eye that he trusted even less than the rest of him. But surely the agent wouldn't hit him when he was tied up and helpless…?_

_'Wha…what are you doing?'_

_To his relief, Derek tucked the gun away temporarily, picked up an old-fashioned looking black telephone and began to dial._

_'I'm calling Sydney Fox,' he replied. 'And when I say, talk…you're going to talk!'_

_IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII_

_Nigel was still angry when Derek finally left the room – to go who knows where? The thug never told him a thing! But he was also increasingly optimistic. Now Sydney was on her way and so escape was even more imperative. There was no way he was going to be used like some deadweight to blackmail Sydney. He was going to get out of there and hide until she arrived._

_So Derek Lloyd thought he was no better than a child? He'd show him!_

_First, however, he had to get himself untied from this sodding chair and, just to prove his point, it had to be a particularly ingenious plan…_

_In the end, 'ingenious' started to feel a little convoluted. He retrieved his glasses from his pocket with his teeth, scraped the chair all the way over to the window, precariously balanced them on the ledge and, positioning himself carefully, he caught the magnification of the sunlight on rope. As the time raced by, however, he started to wonder if it would have been easier to break the glass and cut through…but, still. It was working!_

_'Yes!'_

_Nigel couldn't resist the little exclamation of joy, as the ropes sparked, smouldered and finally broke. He quickly dashed his arms away before they were much scalded._

_Jumping up, Nigel glanced out of the window. They were on the first floor, and there was some sort of wooden-lattice on the side of the building that would help him climb down. Even he could repress his dislike of heights enough to take that opportunity._

_He firmly grasped the bottom of the frame of the locked window and gave it a tug. It rattled but didn't give. He tried again. It creaked agonisingly, but still no progress._

_'I don't know what sort of child could break out of this,' muttered Nigel indignantly. 'Bloody junior body-builder maybe!' Still, Nigel wasn't a child and he knew that a few more thrusts would probably do it…_

_It was then he heard the key in the lock._

_'Oh…oh, bugger!'_

_He yanked increasingly desperately at the bottom of the window. 'Come on! Come on you bastard! Nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnng!'_

_The window burst upwards at the same second as the door flew open._

_Derek dropped the tray of food with a crash and dived forward. He moved unnaturally fast. Nigel had barely clambered onto the window-sill when Derek's hand grabbed the waist band of his trousers, and dragged him back through the window._

_'Get away from me!'_

_Nigel kicked for Derek's shin, but missed completely. His attempt at head-butting was equally unsuccessful. Before he knew it, Derek had shoved him forcefully back down onto the bed, dragging down half the mosquito net with him._

_Not giving in, Nigel tried to roll sideways, only slightly tangling himself in the nets. The door was still slightly ajar; he could still make a run for it through the hotel, surely?_

_'No you don't!' grunted Derek. He seized Nigel's shoulders and pushed him down flat and, before Nigel could even wriggle, both his arms were pinned above his head. Derek was lying on top of him, the weight of his muscular body pushing Nigel's smaller frame right down into the lumpy mattress and crushing the air from his lungs._

_'I…I can't breath…'_

_'I know.'_

_Derek was panting heavily and Nigel found himself staring up into his vivid blue eyes with a new sense of horror._

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Derek Lloyd had only just sidled in the cabin door when he was hit by an unexpected missile – a flying lager can.

It was a great shot. It stuck him on the chin, but didn't do any damage. It was empty.

'I know what you want you lecherous bastard!'

The second can hit Derek's forehead even before he could make it to the bed and fling his hand over Nigel's mouth.

'Will you shut up? The whole ship with hear! Ow…Jesus!'

He withdrew his hand quickly, and stared at the set of red teeth-marks on the palm.

'For Christ's sake, Nigel, was is this all about…and how much have you drunk?'

Nigel was now glaring at him with an aggression Derek had rarely seen in his friend. His arms were folded across his middle, but his eyes were glazed and unfocussed.

'You know exaaaaaaaactly what this is all about!' stated Nigel, his voice disturbingly slurred.

'No,' stated Derek, quietly removing two further empty lager cans from Nigel's reach before they could be wielded against him. 'I have absolutely no idea!'

'Yes, you do…you, you…bugger! I know what you want…you're no better than that fag Bately!'

'I still have no idea what you're talking about, and I'd appreciate it if you'd lower your tone before I have to knock your lights out!'

Derek no longer had his attention one hundred percent on Nigel. He was checking the bottle of Ibuprofen to see exactly how many his friend had taken. He turned back to the bunk, brandishing the half-empty bottle accusingly: 'Jesus, Nigel – these were 600 milligrams each and half the pills have gone! I thought I could trust you to be sensible with these things!'

'Trust me!' spat Nigel. 'That would be a first! You…you did it deliberately, didn't you? You left the booze and the pills because you knew I'd take them…and make it easier on both of us.'

'What the heck? I left them because I did trust you – seems that trust might have been misplaced.' He caught sight of the rubbings and notes, as he trampled them beneath his feet on the floor. 'I take it you've not had that break-though?'

'Can't be arsed,' muttered Nigel. He threw off the blanket that still partially covered him and began unbuttoning his flies. 'Well, what are you waiting for, Derek Lloyd? You've got me locked away at your mercy and I'm as willing as I'll ever be! Why don't you take what you have always wanted? I won't knee you in the balls this time; I won't even bite!'

'What the f…!' Derek grabbed Nigel's wrist and wrenched away his hand before he could make any significant progress. 'Listen to me,' he barked in a tone that instantly demanded attention. 'You are out of your mind on a cocktail of pills and alcohol. I don't know what put this crap into your head, but I do not want to sleep with you; even if I did, I would not because I know you don't want it.'

'No! I don't want it!' spluttered Nigel, the emotion in his voice rising sharply from anger to despair. 'I want Sydney …you have no idea how much I want her…I really want her…why is it all these bloody awful men want me when all I want is Sydney?…and I had her…I had her…it was amazing…she has this way with her…'

'No!' Derek raised his hand in an authoritative gesture of halt that nearly gained the focus of even Nigel's drifting vision. 'I don't want to hear it. In a couple of hours you will regret it – like you're going to regret all of this.' He lowered his hand, backing away; Nigel tried to brush his hair back from where it was splayed down over his forehead, but the un-coordinated gesture only pushed more chestnut locks towards his eyes.

'What put all this rubbish in your head?'

The scowl returned to Nigel's face. 'You know….you know bloody well. You kidnapped me…you kidnapped me before…and then you pinned me to the bed and I knew…I knew then what you wanted…'

'Yes. You knew I didn't want you to escape – not just for my own purposes but because there were dangerous assassins outside.'

Nigel dismissed this with a drunken flap of his hand. 'Pish-posh. I know…I know you were aroused…you….you let your guard down…if you'd been concentrating on being the deadly Derek Lloyd…I'd have never…'

'…got one in my happy-sacks?' grinned Derek. 'Yeah, you caught me off my guard but it was a good move. Right on target! I was impressed…you know, I think that was the moment I really stared to like you!'

'When you had me pinned to the bed? You…you…'

'Shut up and listen,' said Derek, dragging over the wooden stall and forcibly shoving a bottle of water in Nigel's hand. 'Yeah, I first started to respect you when you had me writhing in agony, clutching my manhood! And it wasn't anything to do with sexual arousal!'

'Don't believe you,' growled Nigel, and took a swig of the water.

'Yes you do; at least you will when you're sober.'

'Don't want to be sober. Want more lager!'

'Once again, yes you do want to be sober. I've thought of a plan that will get you to relative safety and helps me to succeed on my mission – and the whole thing rests upon you being in complete control of your faculties!'

Nigel handed back the half-drunken bottle and collapsed backwards down onto the pillow: 'God, my head! The water made it worse…don't want to do anything but sleep.'

'You've got four hours,' snapped Derek, although Nigel's loud snore indicated he was already far gone.

'And don't you worry,' he added, in a hushed tone. 'I'll never mention it again. Any of it.'

**Thanks for reading. Please review!**


	8. Deception

**Disclaimers: as before.**

**Thanks so much for those reviews :) Much, much appreciated!**

CHAPTER EIGHT: DECEPTION.

Sydney stared up at the fuzzy departure screen from a bench in the departures lounge at Heathrow, Terminal 2. Their flight to Moscow was delayed - typical! Apparently, there was fog in the English Channel – but she just couldn't see how this would disrupt a flight that was going northeast, not south.

Sydney groaned internally. She _really_ didn't have time for this!

In some ways, it was a small blessing that Preston had disappeared to mooch around the airport shopping complex. Since the incident in the cab, he had been unnaturally quiet and now seemed very nervous around her. That wasn't a bad thing, she supposed. It wasn't the first time in he had tried to 'hit' on her, but in the circumstances it was just execrable. Besides, she could tell exactly how desperate he was to find out what had happened between her and Nigel. Well, he wasn't going to hear it from her lips, and she was 100 sure he wouldn't hear it from his brother!

It was then that she spotted Anne-Marie, who had just reached the front of the check-in queue and was having her hand luggage searched. She nodded her recognition in Sydney's direction, and then started to make her way over.

'Hello Professor,' she said with a warm smile, offering her hand. 'I hope we can continue our acquaintance on rather better terms than we started it.'

'We started it just fine,' said Sydney, accepting the handshake coldly and casting her mind back to the woman's visit to Trinity. 'I just wish you government people didn't think you had a god-given right to lie! It just seems to make bad situations worse '

'I apologise,' said Ann-Marie chastely. She put down a small leather handbag, and sat down next to Sydney, folding one long leg over another. 'Have you had much experience with us 'government agents?''

'Enough,' breathed Sydney, her mind flashing with a vision of Derek Lloyd in the middle of a New Guinea reserve, secretly assembling a gun so big it could take out a whole heard of stampeding elephants.

'That seems strange, for a history professor,' commented Anne-Marie.

Sydney shot the MI6 woman a questioning glance: 'Are you trying to tell me you don't know about me?'

'Oh…um, you mean that you're a Relic Hunter? Of course I do! I can see that you're the best person to help me if I stumble across anything to do with Nigel's research which might help me achieve that.'

'And we want to find Nigel, right?'

'Of course, of course,' said Anne-Marie but her gentle smile faltered nervously.

Sydney regarded silently for the moment. What was this woman after? She seemed pretty tame for a government agent – a little too willowy, too mousy, with slightly too many freckles, and just too darn twitchy! And if finding Nigel _wasn't_ her priority, maybe she should ditch her right now…

Her thoughts were interrupted as her phone began to emanate a series of not particularly tuneful bleeps.

The name 'Grey' flashed up on the screen. 'Great,' thought Sydney. 'You're the last person I want to talk to right now.'

She switched the mobile off and slammed it back down to the bottom of her satchel.

'Pest caller?'

Sydney sighed heavily: 'Something like that'. It had been three months since she'd last seen Grey, and she truly wished she'd never see him again!

_Sydney shaded her eyes against the overly-bright sun that hung low in the clear blue sky over the Dominican Republic._

'_Why isn't your assistant with us…you, what's his name…uh, Neville?' _

'_Grey, you know full well his name is Nigel.'_

_Grey__ laughed heartily, his eyes darting questioningly between his ex-girlfriend and the road. 'No, honest, I forgot. I knew it was a weird English name, that's all. So why didn't he come with us? I though he was dead keen to the find the Kalinagan crown?'_

'_He was.'_

'_So what gives? He doesn't have a problem with __us__, does he?'' _

_Sydney shot him a tired look that clearly communicated that she didn't want to discuss this right now. Typically, Grey didn't get it._

'_So, he's been hitting on you? __I don't blame him!' Grey laughed. 'Should I be jealous?'_

'_It's over between us. I thought you were fine with that.'_

'_Yeah, fine, fine. 'Friends' not 'lovers'; I can't take the pace, etcetera! But __you and Nigel__? I had no idea…I thought you might have had a thing for that agent guy, Lewis or whatever his name was.'_

'_Lloyd. Derek Lloyd.'_

'_Yeah, that's the one.'_

'_Nope. He tried a couple of times, I resisted without too much of a strain!' _

'_Oh.'_

_Sydney felt particularly irritated. What had she ever seen in this guy? Well, he was okay to look at, that was for sure, but he had all the emotional subtlety of a steamroller!_

_Then, completely out of the blue, he pulled the car over to the verge of the road and yanked up the hand-break. From here, not far from the edge of a shallow cliff, there was a spectacular view across the bay. Azure blue sea lapped up to a beach of flawless white sand, lined only with palm-trees and a cluster of ancient-looking wooden shacks. The low-hanging sun was a vibrant cerise, half-eclipsed by the earth, its serenity only enhanced by purple smudges of fluffy, fair-weather clouds._

_Sydney was momentarily so stunned by the view, she forgot to complain about the uncalled for cessation of their journey._

'_Like it?' asked Grey, his arm coiling along the back of the seats of the open-top Jeep._

'_It's beautiful! But we have to get on. This isn't a holiday, Grey.'_

'_Yeah, but last time I took you on a holiday, it ended up being a Relic Hunt…aren't I owed some time back?'_

'_I don't owe you anything…' _

_Sydney turned sharply, __and then gasped as she found that her lips were just millimetres from his. She started to pull away, but he was leaning so far over that she was pressed back against the car door as it was. She knew she should get out of the car – or sock him one! But she didn't. Instead, she gazed back into his eyes, and let them kindle a strange and familiar glow of excitement, right in the pit of her stomach._

_Hell, he had great lips - and he was a fine kisser. She remembered that rightly, didn't she…?_

'_I really don't owe you anything,' she growled again. _

'_Nah, but there's something you want to give, right?'_

_The kiss was passionate, brief and brim-full of pent-up emotion__. Sydney's caresses bordered on the violent as she thrust her tongue into his mouth, chewed on his lips, and ripped at the back of his hair. It was how she kissed most men - apart from Nigel, of course. With Nigel it was quite different._

'_That's the girl I love,' panted Grey, as they pulled away. 'Hey, let's go down to the beach, watch the sunset? See where life takes us, huh?'_

_Sydney was breathing heavily too, her arm still partially draped around his neck. _

'_What the heck…?' he__r head was screaming. 'I kissed him, I enjoyed it…no I didn't…oh damn, I did…didn't I?' _

_She thought __about Nigel, waiting back at the cabin, still sulking that it was Grey who had met them at the airport and that she had conveniently avoided telling him. God, he had irritated her – but then __why__ exactly hadn't she told him? Even she didn't know the answer. _

_She pulled her arm away: 'This isn't __happening, Grey. That was a mistake and I don't want to go there.'_

'_That did not feel like a mistake to me!' He grinned at her smugly. _

'_You're__ the annoying one', thought Sydney suddenly._

_She shoved him away, so hard he practically smashed back against the opposite car-door. _

'_That __was__ a mistake; and either you drive on to the Kalinagan burial site this instant, or I dump you out of this car and I go on alone.'_

_Grey__ sat up and dusted down his shirt, the smarmy smile not quite wiped off his face: 'Okay. Sydney. Let's go on.' He chuckled wryly to himself, and whispered: 'There is always the journey back…'_

'Where's Bailey?'

The sharp timbre of Ann-Marie's voice snapped Sydney straight back to the present.

'Uh, I don't know.' Sydney cast her eyes around the departure lounge. There was still no sign of Preston. 'Shall I go look for him?'

'That was the second call for our flight, so you'd better, or we will have to go without him. Not that that would be a problem in itself, but I don't trust him. If he's calling the press or his lawyer right now, I'll snap his neck!'

Ann-Marie was half joking, but Sydney wasn't in the mood for any of it: 'Don't worry, you can leave that to me!'

Hooking her satchel over her shoulder, she stalked off in pursuit of the elder Bailey.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Prying a single eye open, Nigel squinted sleepily at Derek. 'Go away! I feel like hell!'

'Yeah, you look like hell too, but we've got work to do, remember?'

Nigel blinked up at the US agent, dredging the details of how he'd got into this mess out of the recesses of his memory. He blinked again and felt the colour rush to his pale cheeks as he recalled some of the things he'd said.

'Oh bugger!' He shut his eyes again and rubbed his forehead miserably. 'I behaved hideously…how…how immensely embarrassing. I didn't mean…um, well, I'd rather I hadn't…will you ever forgive me? Oh bloody hell!'

'I don't know what you're talking about,' stated Derek, hauling the pile of notes onto the bench next to Nigel. Flinching at the sudden jolt of the bunk in his 'delicate' state, Nigel pushed himself up onto his elbows then stared deep into Derek's blue eyes. A knowing twinkle told him everything he needed without the agent moving his lips: 'Yeah, of course I know what you're talking about,' he was silently saying. 'But let's just leave it unsaid.'

'Thanks,' muttered Nigel, accepting a plastic cup full of water from Derek then taking a swig. 'And…sorry…I screwed up earlier. I shouldn't have taken the painkillers then drunk all the lager.'

Derek shrugged: 'We're in a nasty situation. Stress is inevitable; you dealt with it in an unprofessional way…but then, you're not a professional.'

'No - I behaved like an arse! But from now on, things will be different, I promise.' He picked up the first page of the rubbings. 'You…you said you had a plan?'

'Yeah,' breathed Derek. 'I need you to do what you do best – translate this lot. But remember, I need two solutions, the real one and a convincing fake – and I need the latter in less than half an hour.'

'Half an hour? What…why? Why didn't you wake me sooner?'

'There was no point. I've woken you the minimum time it would take for effect of the drugs and alcohol to wear off. But in half an hour, I've got to prove to Deviega you've told me all you know. And then, you're out of my hands.'

Nigel gawped at him in horrified disbelief. 'What? You mean…you mean…you're handing me back to them?'

'I have no choice, my friend. But, as I said, I do have a plan.'

'It had better be a bloody good one!'

'It's not bad,' said Derek, but his tone was deadly serious. He leant forward and spoke in an even more hushed tone than usual. 'We're on a boat in the Barents Sea, about twenty miles from the northern coast of Norway. There's no escape – but it's a one-hundred foot vessel and you _can_ hide – in the ventilation system. It's not going to be comfortable, but this is an old ship, the main pipes between the decks are large… '

'So I hide!' interrupted Nigel. 'How do I get into it? I'll find a place now!'

'No can do - at least, not on my watch. I'm already treading on thin ice. I was told, like the engineers, we were heading up the Baltic, which was why I was so concerned about your revelation about St. Petersburg – only now have I've been told we're on course for the White Sea! They don't trust me, and if I let you get away it would be just too obvious. So you've got to escape alone, and from one of them.'

Nigel's abhorrence returned. 'How? Last time they chained me up…there was just no way.'

'Look, we have no time. This is how it is.' He pulled a handgun from his pocket. 'This is Bately's gun – I took it from his cabin. Deviega will hand you over to him, and you will use it to overpower him and then you will use the grate in his cabin to climb into the ventilation system.'

'_That's_ the plan? It's impossible! He's twice my size…and…and…'

'If I have heard rightly you escaped from him before.'

'Yes…but…'

'And you might have escaped from me had not pictures of the Kaino Mata been strewn over the floor. That stopped you in your tracks!'

'That was very different!'

'It was no different – particularly given certain ideas that you seem to have formulated about me.'

Nigel glowered at him. Derek had implied he'd never mention that outburst, and barely five seconds later he was rubbing it in his face! Yet, once again, Nigel's reasonably side struggled to tell him that Derek's plan was as good as it got. What other way was there without getting them both killed?

'You'll be okay,' said Derek, his voice suddenly low and tender. 'I'll be back in twenty minutes. I'll tell you the rest of the plan then.'

'There's more?'

'Hell, yeah – we need to get that Needle don't we? Once you're in those pipes, you've got some stolen Kremlin documents to locate! Now go to work.'

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Derek guided Nigel into the room, a single hand on his shoulder and pushed him down onto a plain wooden chair in the middle.

Nigel took a long, shuddering breath as his friend disappeared out of his sightline. There was Bellimo and Deviega, both standing in front a large, metal table, covered with papers, which tottered from side-to-side with the swell of the waves. There was no sign of Bately – but it could only be a matter of time. Above all, he was terrified that somebody would discover the gun, stuffed down the back of his waistband and concealed beneath the baggy t-shirt.

'You took your time, Watson, this had better be good,' said Deviega intemperately. He then shifted his gaze onto Nigel who – incredibly hung-over as he was - did, indeed, look as if he had had a very rough time.

'Good God, man, you seem to have put him through the paces', he chuckled. 'Well, Bailey, have you been a good boy and done your homework?'

Nigel forced an unimpressed sneer and pulled a folded piece of the rubbings from his pocket: 'I've cracked the formula, if that's what you want to know.'

Deviega snatched the paper from him. 'What does it say?'

'On this page, we have the Egyptian hieroglyph for Mercury…and, see, the symbol for the obelisk? Then there is a little guy with a hammer.' It wasn't a hammer, it was a shepherd's hook, and the Egyptians had no known symbol for Mercury, only Tin, but Nigel was bluffing for his life. 'Okay, so…the key is the obelisk itself. It must be made out of some-sort of unstable element or compound that reacts with Mercury, some sort of naturally occurring Nitramine that existed thousands of years before they were even discovered.' Derek had added this last bit of lie, and Nigel hoped to hell it was as impressive as it sounded. 'So maybe chipping bits off destabilises it…and then the reaction with Mercury causes the explosion.'

It was codswallop. But would they buy it?

Deviega examined the paper closely, stroking his chin, and then handed the sheet to Bellimo. 'I think he's telling the truth. But we'll only know for sure when we reach our destination.'

Bellimo was not going to argue with 'the boss.' He gestured to Nigel. 'Is _he_ any more use, then?'

'I…I will be…' stuttered Nigel. Derek had told him to beg a bit, just to look convincing. 'What if there's more…on the Needle itself. You'll need somebody to translate them then!'

Deviega merely laughed. 'Watson!' he barked. Nigel felt Derek's hand slam down on his shoulder. Relief flooded through him that his friend was still there. 'You're quite sure he's not holding anything back.'

'Quite sure,' said Derek firmly. 'Do you question my credentials?'

'Yes, but we can't afford to keep him around any longer – the last thing I want is Sydney Fox sniffing on our trail.'

'So I give him to Bately?' Derek's suggestion was overtly casual.

'Ha – yes, why not. The pathetic swine has waited long enough; can't see the attraction myself…'

'No!' pleaded Nigel. 'Not that! Anything but that! I'll go back through the rubbings…there might be something else…anything else!'

As the back of Deviega's hand cracked against his cheekbone, Nigel decided he'd pushed the 'pleading' act quite far enough. He let Derek haul him up, and rested much of his weight against him as the agent bundled him from the room.

'You okay?' whispered Derek, as they entered the narrow, grey corridor that ran along the side deck of the ship, parallel with an open-railed deck.

'I suppose I'd better be,' moaned Nigel, then hissed through his teeth as he touched the blossoming bruise. 'But…but what if I can't incapacitate Bately? Will you be somewhere near?'

'No. You're on your own. I've got to be on deck to implement a well-timed splash and yell 'man-overboard.' Without that, they'll hunt you down on the ship.'

Nigel swallowed slowly, as the truth of what Derek was asking him to do really dawned on him. He was supposed to shoot – and to kill, if necessary.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Sydney spotted Preston on the far side of the departure lounge, hovering in the entrance to the gentleman's toilets.

The instant he saw her, he began gesturing wildly that she should come over. Sydney was already halfway there.

'What the heck are you doing?' she demanded, as he caught her arm and began dragging her towards the washrooms.

'We need to talk - somewhere that Ann-Marie woman won't find us!'

'She's over the other side of the departure lounge. And I'm sure as hell not going in there!' She motioned with her eyes to the 'Gents' sign.

'Oh…uh, yes. Maybe not. I wasn't really thinking straight.'

'Are any of us?' thought Sydney exhaustedly.

'Look, what's this about, Preston? Our flight has been called.'

'I don't think we should go to Moscow with her,' began Preston hastily. 'I've got a friend, another Oxford chap, Cecil Boyd, who works at the MoD. Anyway, I called him from the Gents just now and he's done me a few checks on Ms Gregory here…and…'

Sydney had left a message with Karen to do the same, and was mildly impressed that Preston had beaten her to it. 'Go on…' she entreated.

'Well… she _does_ work for MI6.'

'Thank God,' breathed Sydney. 'She doesn't seem the most competent agent, but we need all the help we can get.'

Preston still looked deeply uncomfortable: 'Yes, but Cecil said she did a London desk job, and has never been on an overseas mission. So I think to myself: 'this is a bit odd. Her dragging us off to Russia''.

'Not necessarily. Remember, she seems to have been focussed on the Bellimo case before. That was European, if not domestic…'

'It still smells funny to me, and this whole Moscow thing…why Moscow? Russia is an enormous place, why start there?'

'Because that's where the government papers have been disappearing from and it's the only lead we've got!' Sydney's tone was irritable, and she trailed off as the third and final call for their flight was announced over the loudspeakers. 'Look, I've got to go.'

'No!' Preston grabbed her sleeve. 'I don't think you should… we need to go to… to... St. Petersburg!'

'St Petersburg?' Sydney narrowed her eyes sharply. Preston's face was flushed, his eyes glowing with an agitated excitement. He was breathing very fast.

'Preston, what have you been keeping from me?'

'Jesus Christ, she's going to kill me,' thought Preston, as he reached into his top pocket.

'Look, I've had this since early this afternoon, well I guess its yesterday afternoon now, and…and... I…I suppose I was trying to kid myself it wouldn't be of any relevance… and I didn't know it was for sure until Ann-Marie arrived and then I didn't want a say in front of her…'

Sydney had already snatched the aging piece of paper from his hand and was casting her eyes over it. It was the shipping order for the obelisk to be transported from Cairo to an address in St Petersburg in 1915, signed by Boris Dostoyevsky.

Sydney's voice was eerily calm: 'You've had this all along? And you never said a word?'

'Uh… well… yes…'

'_Why_, Preston?

'I…I don't know…'

It was the honest answer - sort of. The better part of his nature really couldn't justify it, and the rest of him only sort of knew why. All along, he had harboured a mad hope that Sydney would find Nigel anyway, while he could quietly crack the mystery of the obelisk. Wasn't that it?

'You bastard!'

The words were quiet, but the fist came out of nowhere. Sydney socked him clean on the jaw, sending him sagging back against the gentleman's toilet sign.

Two security guards immediately came sprinting over.

'Are you alright, sir?' asked the first, a female officer.

'You'll have to come with me, Miss!' The second, a burly man with very shortly cropped hair, took hold of Sydney's arm; she was still so angry she shook him off instantly.

'It was _the_ _lead_, Preston!' she yelled. 'We could have been in St Petersburg by now!' A further group of guards came running over

Preston, who was still rubbing his sore chin, realised the situation was getting increasingly out of hand by the second: 'Please,' he shouted at the security team. 'I deserved it, leave her alone! We're just having a…a…um, 'lover's tiff''.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Preston, guiltily and willingly, paid a £500 on-the-spot fine for disturbing the peace, and finally they were left alone.

Sydney's anger was still blazing like an inferno: 'I can't believe you gambled on Nigel's life like that. If he's dead, Preston… it's all your fault… oh, heck, I haven't got time for this.'

She turned and stalked off across the complex, but Preston remained hot on her heels.

'Look, I'm sorry, I'm sorry….but are you going to Moscow or St Petersburg? There's a flight to St Petersburg in half an hour…'

Sydney said nothing, but she'd already made up her mind. She was going to St Petersburg. 'That's the last place I know where the Needle was,' she thought to herself. 'I pick up the trail there, maybe I find Nigel.'

'… but there aren't any tickets left for it!' finished Preston.

Sydney turned, and the vitriol in her eyes hit him twice as hard as her punch had.

'I'm going to be on that flight, if I have to cling to the wheels at takeoff! Now get out of my sight! If I ever see you again, I can't be responsible for my actions!'

She wheeled away, but he caught her by the shoulder. It took the greatest willpower in the world not to strike him again.

'Look, Sydney, what I did was wrong, I know that…but…but… if you accept this from me, it will save you one hell of a dicey journey hanging from those wheels.'

He thrust into her hand a ticket, booked in her name, for the flight to St Petersburg.

'I got the last two, just before I called Cecil. And, really… we couldn't have been in St Petersburg any quicker. It's the first flight for twelve hours… I checked before, honest!'

'Never try and convince me you're honest, Preston Bailey,' spat Sydney. But she accepted the ticket, nevertheless.

'Come on. We need to go to a different departure lounge… and I think we owe it to Ann-Marie to at least tell her of our change of plans.'

Preston nodded silently, and followed her like a meek puppy dog. 'Actually', he thought himself, with a modicum of relief, 'I think I got off relatively lightly…'

Deep down, however, it didn't make him feel any better.

**Thanks for reading. Please review.**


	9. Broken

**Disclaimers: as ever for RH. The lyrics of the song November Rain are by Axl Rose.**

**Thanks for those reviews. This chapter contains my first attempt at incorporating song lyrics. Not sure it works – Aryea and Tanya Reed are the experts in that field – but I had fun. Hehe, and Aryea – this is the chapter for which I rewrote the whole middle section for because of major 'brain share' :)**

CHAPTER NINE: BROKEN

By the time that Sydney returned to where she had left Ann-Marie, she was gone.

Sydney was hardly surprised. She and Preston had certainly missed the flight to Moscow, and she guessed that Ann-Marie had given up on them and gone.

She then found she had to sprint to reach the boarding desk for the British Airways flight to St Petersburg, just before it closed.

Sydney Fox was not in the best of tempers, then, when she finally found her seat. It was, to her disgust, next to Preston, who was apparently having a quick doze. Nevertheless, it was in First Class and she gained a small amount of satisfaction in thinking how much the tickets must have cost him!

She violently barged his knees out of the way to get by the window seat, causing his eyes to fly abruptly open.

He dared not look cross. In fact, he ventured a tentative smile.

'Err, Hello, Sydney. Did you find her?'

'No. She's gone to Moscow. We'll have to contact her when we get there!' She shot him a venomous glare. 'I see guilt doesn't bear so heavily on your shoulders that you can't take a quick nap!'

'I wasn't asleep,' protested Preston, although he had been pretty sleepy. 'And…well… I really am sorry about what I did. Everything happened so quickly…I…I just didn't think it through.'

'Whatever,' sighed Sydney, pressing the button on her seat so that it tipped back into a more relaxing position - even though she, too, knew that sleep would be impossible. She pulled out an eye mask, ready to slip on. At least this meant that she wouldn't have to look at Preston Bailey!

'I _really_ am sorry,' he blurted again. 'Sometimes… sometimes, particularly with Nigel, I just can't explain what I do…'

Sydney paused. As furious as she was with him right now, Preston had somehow latched onto her own conscience. It suddenly felt necessary to give him an inch, a gesture to communicate she _sort_ of understood.

She didn't smile, but her frown softened: 'We all do things we can't explain sometimes, I guess,' she sighed. She pulled the mask down over her eyes and shoved in some headphones, not caring what was playing on the in-flight radio, and leant back in the seat.

'We all do things we can't explain sometimes…'

_Nigel had been waiting in her motel room when she and Grey got back from the Kalinagan burial site. He was sitting on the bed, his arms folded. There was a scowl on his face that she found particularly petulant._

_Grey had been with her at the latch and they'd been laughing and joking – at least, that's how it looked on the surface. They'd uncovered the relic. It had been a relatively easy feat, after she'd taken her own life in her hands to prevent Grey being decapitated by Kalinagan spinning-dart death trap. After that, Sydney had deliberately grabbed the car-keys out of his hand and driven back herself, her foot grinding on the accelerator every time he suggested they stopped to 'enjoy' the night. But this guy wasn't subtle and he didn't take hints. Sydney had joylessly gigged over grinding teeth at his attempts at seductive chatter, and several times been on the verge of giving him another verbal battering, if not an actual one._

_But now here was her other little 'problem.'_

'_Hello Nigel,' she said dryly, as her 'ex' bumbled into the room behind her. _

'_Oh…hey there,' grinned Grey with a smirk. Sydney soon wiped that from his face with formidable glare. 'I'll…I'll be in the bar,' he mumbled, and left the room. _

'_See you tomorrow, Grey.' She closed the door behind her, and then leaned back against it._

'_So…did you get it?' asked Nigel, his voice dripping with resentment._

'_Yes.'_

'_Great. I'm so happy for you. I suppose that proves that my services are, in every way, quite dispensable to you.'_

_Syd launched herself away from the door, and stomped over towards the bathroom, pulling the pin out of her hair and letting it tumble down around her shoulders. All she wanted was to relax in a nice, soothing bath. Why should she put up with __this_

'_Nigel, you know you are __in__dispensable to me, and I wanted you there. __You__ are the one who said you didn't want to come with me.'_

_Nigel had jumped up from the bed and was now hovering behind her. 'I…I never said I didn't want to come with you. What I said was I couldn't stand a moment more of watching you and Grey flirt. It makes me feel ill!'_

'_I keep telling you, we were not flirting or, at least, I wasn't flirting with him.' As she spoke, Sydney pulled her black, Lycra top off over her head, noting that Nigel looked away, embarrassed. He hadn't done that for a while._

'_You know I'm not interested in him anymore, so you've, uh, got no reason to be so touchy about it,' she continued, matter-of-factly._

'_No reason!' Nigel now stared at her anyway despite the fact she was only wearing a lacy bra on her top-half. 'Of course I've got a reason! He still thinks that he's got a chance with you, because you __refuse__ to tell him that we're together… for what it's worth!'_

'_But if we tell him, we're going to have to tell everyone.'_

'_And what's so wrong with that? Are you really so ashamed of me?'_

'_No…of course not.'_

_Nigel pushed his fingers back through his hair in exasperation as she turned her back on him and walked into the bathroom. 'Then for heaven's sake, why can't we come clean with the world?'_

'_We've been though this more than enough!'_

_She slammed the door in his face._

_Nigel kicked the back of the door furiously, his temper boiling over. 'Yeah, we've been through it – but not enough for me! Let's be honest with each other, shall we? The only reason you wanted to keep things quiet about us is so you can continue sleeping around!'_

_Sydney nearly stomped back into the bedroom and punched him in the face. She resisted. Just._

_The second accusation was quieter but just as stinging._

_'You slept with Grey again, didn't you?'_

_She hurled the door open with such a livid energy that Nigel stumbled backwards. He was obviously expecting to be slapped, but she stopped short. _

'_How dare you!' she spat. _

_Nigel panted incredulously. 'How dare you? How bloody dare __you__! I mean, tell me Sydney, what is this all about? Do you love me, or don't you? What the hell is your explanation for all this stupid secrecy?'_

'_I need some space, Nigel…and I have nothing more to say!' She banged the door shut in his face again._

**Do you need some time...on your own?  
Do you need some time...all alone?**

'You fool,' thought Sydney as the plane tore off up of the runway. She ripped out the headphones although the words of the song playing on the in-flight sound-system still resonated around her soul:

**So if you want to love me  
then darlin' don't refrain  
Or I'll just end up walkin'  
In the cold November rain  
**

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Bately had a cabin not dissimilar to Derek's but on a corridor on a different deck. Nigel, even though he usually prided himself on having a decent sense of direction, found it difficult to orientate where he was.

'How will I find my way through the ventilation system once I've escaped?' he worried, as Derek turned the key in the lock. 'And how about finding my way to, um, you know, steal the papers?'

'You will,' said Derek, and flung the door open to reveal an empty room. 'Bately will be off his engine room shift in about ten minutes.'

Nigel ignored the horror of this last revelation: 'Is that it? _You will_? And what about getting the grate off the wall?'

'You will,' repeated Derek, this time more emphatically. He gave the reluctant Nigel a little push into the room. 'I loosened the screws, so it should come off easily. The most important this is that you incapacitate him.'

Nigel stared back at him, aghast. He thought that Derek didn't trust him with anything - and now he was presuming he could perform the superhuman!

'What…what if…'

'There will be no 'what ifs',' said Derek, but this time he tried to sound encouraging, even as he glanced, warily, behind him up the corridor.

'Good luck,' he mouthed, then closed the door and was gone.

'Well, this is just marvellous,' thought Nigel, instinctively hugging his arms around himself as he sat down on the bunk. 'So now I have to sit here for ten minutes to find out if I'm going to have to commit a murder or…or…'

Nigel took a deep breath. This wasn't helping anything; he had to stay calm and think practical thoughts, not submit to panic. If he screwed up now, they'd both be dead.

He glanced up at the grate on the wall. It was pretty small, and it would be a squeeze him for him to get through there - what's more, it still looked pretty tightly screwed down to him, despite what Derek said.

He went over and gave it a rattle. He was right! If Derek had loosened this, somebody had screwed it back on. There was no way it was coming off in a hurry, particularly in a panicked hurry after he'd shot somebody and just before he was about to fake his own death!

'Damn! Damn! How the hell am I going to get the screws out?' thought Nigel. 'And why didn't Derek give me an emergency screwdriver?'

Then a revelation struck him. When they had dried, Derek had given him his original clothes back. While he'd not put them back on, he had carefully retrieved the few little belongings they still contained. So - he reached into his pocket and drew out his trusty British Library Readers Card.

Given half a chance this time, it worked just as well as any power-tool! The sturdy plastic and loosened the screws in no time - but still not fast enough. He was just finishing the third one when he heard voices and laughter outside the door.

Bately! Nigel glanced at the bunk and made an executive decision. No, he wasn't going to lie there like a sacrificial lamb, waiting for the wolf to ravage him.

Nigel dashed behind the opening door, and held his breath as the bulky, pony-tailed figure stepped through the portal and then paused, staring at the apparently empty bunk.

Then he cracked the barrel of the pistol up against the back of Bately's head, and kicked shut the door.

It was a vicious blow, instantly drawing blood. Bately crashed to the floor and lay still.

Nigel, his hands shaking, took a tentative step towards the fallen man, the barrel pointed at his unguarded back, then sidled alongside him toward the grate. Surely it couldn't be that easy? But even as he reached into his pocket to retrieve the Library Card, Bately suddenly rolled over – then launched himself up at Nigel at such a pace he scarcely saw him coming.

What the f…? You little shit!'

Bately grabbed Nigel's legs, toppling him to the ground. Nigel suddenly felt the whole weight of the much-larger man on top of him, pressing him into the ground – and saw his meaty hands grasping for the gun.

'Oh hell!' thought Nigel, fumbling with the safety catch. He elbowed wildly backwards, crunching Bately on the nose. The henchman grabbed his face in agony, allowing Nigel to wriggle free. He backed up, scrunching himself in the corner of the small cabin, and pointed the gun. Bately, his nose streaming, stepped back, his hands raised slightly.

'Drop it, Bailey. You're making this a hell of a lot harder on yourself than it needs to be.'

'No! You back off, or I'm going to kill you!' Nigel's low voice faltered nervously over the words as his mind screamed: 'What are you doing? You've got to shoot him, not hold him to ransom! You _know_ what he wanted to do to you…'

Nigel jerked the gun up, aiming just below Bately's left shoulder and squeezed the trigger. Nothing happened.

'Oh God!' Nigel could feel his pulse pounding in his temples. It didn't matter how many times Derek had shown him. In the pressure of the moment, he'd still not successfully got the safety catch off…

'You're dead, boy!' Bately hurled himself towards Nigel again, grabbing for the gun. Nigel greeted him with a boot on the chest, and then lurched sideways with the gun still in his hand.

He wrenched at the catch, and it finally gave way with a satisfactory click.

Nevertheless, before he could even shoot randomly, Bately's hand had clamped down around his wrist forcing it above his head.

'Agh!' Nigel brought up a second hand to try and pry it away. Bately wasn't giving in, though, and was closing down on top of Nigel again. He'd have the gun off of him and an instant, he knew it.

Nigel never knew how he did it. He punched Bately suddenly in the teeth and, with every ounce of strength, wrenched his other hand away. Then pulled the trigger. Gunshot exploded in his ears, and recoil sent him smashing back against the wall, vibrating with the shockwaves.

Nigel didn't know where he hit the other man. He scarcely cared. All he knew was that Bately's body suddenly crumpled towards him. Then he felt the sticky warmth of his blood against his skin.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Nigel wriggled his way out from under the stricken man. He was still breathing, Nigel could tell, but he was bleeding profusely. Half of it seemed to be on Nigel himself.

His hands now trembling violently, Nigel tossed the gun onto the bunk, picked up his shirt and, averting his eyes from the heap on the floor, he tried to think straight. There was a plan, now. He had to execute Derek's plan.

'Set the door ajar,' muttered Nigel to himself, 'climb into the ventilation system, and crawl as far as you can. Okay!' He puffed out his cheeks, letting out a long breath. 'You can do that.'

He could already hear shouts and approaching footsteps when he pushed the door a little open – and then he remembered there was still a screw to loosen on the grate.

'Damn, damn…' His fingers felt like lead as he frantically yanked at it with his Library Card, but somehow it came away. The entrance to the tunnel was only a little above waist height, and he threw himself into it just as the room was entered. Fortunately, Bellimo's focus was grabbed solely by the body on the floor and he never saw the grate on the wall click back into place at absolutely the last moment.

Nigel was easing himself up the tunnel, propelling himself forward with hands, knees and elbows, when he heard Deviega thunder into the room behind him.

Sydney's nemesis laughed, a sound every bit as aggressive as the echo of the bullet. Nigel froze, scared the criminal mastermind would detect the tiniest scratch of movement.

'What a bloody fool,' he guffawed, 'and I'm not in the slightest bit surprised! Bailey's got more nouse in his little finger that that imbecile had in his whole thick skull.'

'Well, where _is _Bailey?' Nigel flinched at the pitch of Bellimo's anger, concealed though he was.

'He can't get far,' growled Deviega. 'And I might just give him a pat on the back before I wring his neck…what? What the hell's going on now?'

Nigel strained his ears as he heard another set of footsteps thudding down the corridor, another gruff voice shouting at the top of his lungs.

'Man over board!' came the cry in another, unfamiliar voice. 'Man over board!'

'What the…? Who? Did anybody see…'

'Watson raised the alarm. He thinks it was the prisoner!'

'What? Are you sure…did he see him in the sea? Of course, he won't survive five minutes in the icy water!'

'Suicide,' mumbled Bellimo. 'The self-centred little sod! Will somebody come help me get Bately to the medical deck…somebody?'

Deviega, however, had already left the room. Nigel, still immobilised in the pipe, pressed his cheek against the cold steel and prayed to whoever would listen that Deviega would take Derek at his word.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Derek Lloyd pulled his gun from his back pocket the moment he entered his cabin. Somebody was in the washroom cubicle. He could sense it…

He kicked the door open violently, and jumped in to the tiny confined space, landing square on two feet.

'Ow…for heaven's sake!' The door bounced back revealing Nigel standing behind it, angrily rubbing his forehead. 'Surely you knew it was me?'

'I can't be sure of anything, my friend. We're treading on extremely thin ice…Jesus Christ!' He grabbed Nigel's arm, yanking him further into the reach of the thin, florescent light, scrutinising him closely. 'Is any of this blood yours?'

Nigel's shirt was ripped and stained and even his face was blotted with dark, red smears.

'No, it's not mine…I was actually trying to wash it off, if you don't mind?'

'I do. You can't be here, it's too dangerous. You've got to get back into that pipe.' He began tugging Nigel out of the door.

Nigel gawped at him a moment in disbelief, before emphatically wresting his arm away. 'Well _I _don't care! I'm having a wash…and…and…'

Nigel wanted to say: 'aren't you even in the slightest bit impressed? That I pulled it off? That I escaped alone? That I actually shot him?'

Derek's expression, however, was as steely as ever - apart from that confusingly amicable, hangdog glimmer, which Nigel always caught when he looked the agent straight in the eye. The look that made him forgive…well, most things.

But, for Nigel, there was still one burning question. 'Did I, did I…'

'Did you kill Bately? Yes, it was a good shot so don't beat yourself up over it. Kill or be killed, right?'

Nigel nodded silently and stomped into the bathroom, running cold water into the little sink and splashing it onto his face.

'You're compromising the mission,' stated Derek plainly, leaning almost languidly against the doorframe, his gun drooping from his hand.

'Will you bugger off?' snapped Nigel, and kicked the door shut in his face. He'd killed a man – again. Sydney didn't kill – at least, he'd never seen her kill, even in the most desperate of circumstances, so what sort of monster did that make him?

He didn't even want to think about it but, staring at his pale-looking face in the mirror, his hair sticking out at all angles and his eyes dulled with tiredness, he couldn't help wondering why he'd ever even held up hope for himself with her. What he'd just done made him feel broken, morally and physically. She'd never want him back.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

'Sydney? Sydney – wake up!'

'What? Oh, Preston, are we there yet?'

Nigel's brother was leaning towards her, the face starkly illuminated by the harsh morning light. He looked exhausted; his forehead was lined, there was a light shade of stubble on his chin and heavy grey patches had formed under his eyes. Nigel had told her that Preston was six years his senior; right now, he looked at least fifteen years older. Then, again, as she lifted a hand to her dishevelled hair, she guessed that she didn't look much better!

'Yes, we're there. We landed just a few minutes ago, and we're going to be disembarking shortly.' He offered her a pale smile. 'I'm glad you managed to get some sleep.'

'I don't feel much better for it,' she confessed, rolling back her shoulders and flexing her hands, so her joints clicked back towards something resembling normality.

'Well, I'm sure you will later. I didn't get a wink…um, guilty conscience I guess…' He paused, attempting to gage her reaction, then cringed: 'Do you really hate me – for what I did?'

For some reason, as inexplicable as most things seemed lately, Sydney almost laughed. But instead, she merely reached into her bag for a hairbrush and began scraping it through her heavy-feeling hair.

'Nope. I don't hate you, Preston – although maybe I should. We've all done things we've regretted lately…'

**And when your fears subside  
And shadows still remain, **

**I know that you can love me  
When there's no one left to blame  
**

Preston's weary countenance half lit-up: 'Thanks…well, not that it's true. I mean, whatever happened between you and Nigel, it can't be that bad. You'll, um, sort it out right? Even if it's just to be friends again…'

'Right,' murmured Sydney, but she was no longer listening to him. She was staring out onto the grey world of Pulkovo airport and the leaden skies of one of the most easterly cities in Europe. It was raining. Not hard, just a persistent, late autumn drizzle. It looked cold out there, too. Well, of course it would be; it was Russia. She reached mindlessly into her satchel for her black leather gloves.

**So never mind the darkness  
We still can find a way  
'Cause nothin' lasts forever  
Even cold November rain**

'I'll find you Nigel,' she thought herself. 'Wherever you are, whatever it takes, I'll find you. And we still _can_ find a way…'

**Thanks for reading. Please review.**


	10. Dynamite

**Disclaimers: as before.**

**Thanks for those reviews! Sorry this has been a while coming – been busy with some other stories, Xmas etc. Its also a bit of a 'wordy' one...but bear with me, lots of action to come ;)**

CHAPTER TEN: DYNAMITE

'It's a stunning city!' exclaimed Preston as he hurried behind Sydney over Lieutenant Schmidt Bridge. 'I was expecting St. Petersburg to be interesting, but all these beautiful, eighteenth century palaces, and this bridge with dancing seahorses on the railings! Superb!'

'Yeah, St Petersburg is a gem,' admitted Sydney, glancing back over her shoulder, 'and a survivor. The Nazis laid siege to the city for twenty-nine months in the Second World War. Thousands, millions even, were killed or starved. It was Hitler's plan to wipe the city off the face of the Earth…this place has know real suffering.'

'And still manages to be so beautiful,' murmured Preston, picking up reflective tone. 'Although it is uncommonly cold…Oh my Goodness! Look, Sydney! It can't be? Surely…?'

Sydney laughed, as Preston pointed frantically in the direction of what appeared to be an Egyptian obelisk, protruding from another bridge a little way up the river, and guarded by four magnificent, cast-iron sphinxes.

'No, Preston, it's not! Nothing is ever _that_ easy! That's the Egyptian Bridge - it was originally built one hundred and fifty years ago and is the oldest metal Bridge in Russia, but it certainly isn't Cleopatra's Needle!'

'Oh, uh, of course not,' muttered Preston, embarrassed at his sudden overexcitement. 'I knew that, really, I just forgot. So have you got a clue where this Angliskaya place is, the address mentioned on the shipping order?'

'Actually, yes I do. Angliskaya, as I'm sure you know, translates as 'English', so we're heading for the 'English Embankment.' She pointed to an impressive series of palatial houses at the far side of the bridge. Behind them, loomed the golden dome of St Isaac's Cathedral that, to Preston, was instantly reminiscent of London's St Paul's. 'In 1916, Dostoyevsky had the obelisk transported to one of _those_ houses. So that's the start of our trail.'

'Oh, very good,' puffed Preston, as Sydney speeded ahead again. 'And, of course, I _knew _that Angliskaya meant English!'

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

'It's okay - I'm going, I'm going!'

Nigel emerged from the bathroom, to find Derek waiting impatiently on the other side, his gun now tucked rather casually in his belt.

'And don't worry!' continued Nigel, slightly disarmed by the other man's persistent, twinkle-eyed stare. 'I won't make a mess in your beautiful en-suite bathroom again - although I believe I've left it rather cleaner than I found it!'

'Yeah, Nigel, thanks,' replied Derek sardonically. 'Now make yourself scarce! I'll send you a signal at zero-hundred-hours that you should proceed to Deviega's mess room and identify the whereabouts of the obelisk from the stolen Kremlin papers.'

'Zero-hundred-hours? If you don't mind me asking, why don't you just say midnight – its _actually_ quicker?'

Derek grinned. 'You really want me to kick your ass, don't you?'

'No I bloody well don't,' mumbled Nigel, sinking down onto the bunk. 'I just wish you'd speak English, that's all! So you simply want me to look at the Russian papers - you _don't_ want me to try and get the rubbings back?'

'If you can translate any more, that would be a plus. But you must not _take _anything, or leave any evidence that you're anything but as dead as that fool, Bately.' Derek snorted, vaguely jovially. 'Let's pretend you did for yourself as well as you did for him!'

'Oh God, could you please not remind me about that?' Nigel ran his fingers agitatedly across his forehead. 'Its not…not something I'm proud of.'

'You'll live with yourself,' muttered Derek. Nigel felt a hand touch his arm, but only for an instant. A muscle in the agent's jaw quivered slightly, as if he had something else on this to say on this emotive topic – but then he was back to business.

'Okay. You've got four hours, so get in that pipe and get some sleep. You sure as heck look as if you need it!'

Nigel stared at him for a moment, gave an almost indiscernibly shake of his head, then rose and headed for the grate. 'I'm not entirely sure how I'm supposed to sleep in there,' he grumbled. 'It's sort of, um… freezing!'

'Yeah, we're over 71 degrees north; its below freezing outside, and the heating on this ship isn't great. Probably all for the best, or those pipes might be full of fumes and then you'd be suffering from chemical poisoning instead of hypothermia!'

'Is that supposed to be a joke?' asked Nigel, hauling himself up and sliding into the ventilation system.

Derek's only reply was to grab a blanket off his bed and shove it at Nigel's feet. 'Here - you better take this.'

Twisting back, Nigel scowled ironically and picked up the moth-eaten, brown cover. 'Thanks…its better than hypothermia, I guess…so, um, what will this signal be?'

'I'll whack the pipe with my gun,' smirked Derek. 'That'll wake the dead!'

'This keeps getting better and better! Okay, much obliged, but do you think you could bugger off now?'

'With pleasure,' laughed Derek. He squeezed the back of Nigel's leg as it disappeared up into the pipe, causing Nigel to look back abruptly.

'You know, you're doing great, buddy!' he winked. 'Now disappear!'

'Bloody slave-driver,' bitched Nigel, then he shuffled off around a u-bend to find what comfortable accommodation the ship's ventilation system could offer.

All the same, once it was dark and he was alone again, the notion that Derek thought he was 'doing great', didn't make him feel better at all. He shivered and curled himself into a ball inside the blanket, wishing he didn't have to think about it.

'Doing great' at what? As far as he could tell, he'd only done two things successfully so far: lie and kill.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

'Looks like some sort of warehouse!' Sydney pressed her face against the ground floor window of a tall building, much plainer than the others on the 'Angliskaya Embankment'. Large, double doors on the first-floor and the decayed remains of winches indicated that goods were once transported into it from boats on the River Neva. 'There's some interesting stuff in here,' she observed. 'Antique furniture, some sculpture…'

'Maybe it's an auction house?' conjectured Preston.

'Could be! It doesn't look like anybody is about, though. Can you see a doorbell?'

'It looks like the door is…uh, over there.'

They both made their way down to a modest looking entrance, at basement level. Sure enough, there was a sign. 'Антикварные аукционы'.

'Antique auctions', translated Sydney. I wonder how long this building has been used for a purpose like that? Maybe Dostoyevsky just sold the obelisk? He _was _a notorious rogue!'

Sydney rang the bell and knocked hard on the door. Nobody came.

'You're not going to start breaking and entering again, are you?' whispered Preston nervously.

'Not yet,' breathed Sydney. 'This door is alarmed, and I doubt your trick with the spark plugs is going to work twice! I'm going to look around the other side, see if there's a better way in.'

The other side of the warehouse was on a narrow and quieter street, divided from the regal splendour of Saint Isaacs Cathedral by a single terrace. The warehouse had its main entrance here: a set of steps, on a nigh-Palladian scale, swept up to a first-floor double-doorway. The peeling green paint on the railings and door itself, however, indicated that it hadn't been used for some time.

By the doors at the top of the steps was a tarnished brass plaque. Sydney began to rub at it furiously with her sleeve.

'That plaque is old,' observed Preston. 'You think that it might give us a clue what the building was used for in 1916?'

'That's what I'm hoping,' breathed Sydney. 'Ah... here we are.'

'Королевский Склад'

'Yes!' Sydney pumped her fist with excitement.

''Королевский,' means Royal, of course…' began Preston, proud to have remembered somthing.

'…and Склад means warehouse. This is all starting to make sense – prior to the 1917 revolution, this building must have functioned as a sort of holding-place for goods being transferred to the Royal Palaces. Dostoyevsky must have either sold or given the obelisk to the Tsar!'

Preston frowned: 'But surely that makes this a dead end? If the obelisk was taken to the Royal Palaces, it would have been looted - if not by the Bolsheviks then by the Nazis in the Second World War. Hell, it's probably gone the way of the Amber Room!'

Sydney was frowning now too. Preston had a point: locating anything that was taken from the St. Petersburg Palaces during their stormy 20th Century history was going to be a million times harder than searching for a needle in a haystack the size of Russia itself. Then again, she was the world's foremost Relic Hunter…

'Damn! We _need _to find out what was in those papers which Bellimo and Deviega stole from the Kremlin… even if they have the originals in their possession, someone must know!'

'You mean we should ask somebody in the Russian government? They're hardly going to help _us_, are they? Ann-Marie said they are already up in arms over the theft and blaming the British and Americans!'

'You'd be surprised. The Cold War _is_ over and a couple of years ago I did a Russian agent a little favour - and she showed herself to be more than a little fond of Nigel.' Syd pulled out her phone. 'There's a possibility Tatiana could pull some strings for us…'

'Do not move, Professor Fox! You are under arrest!'

At the shout, Sydney, groaning internally, lifted her hands in the air. Preston hastily did the same. At the bottom on the steps, were a man and a woman. The man, who pointed a gun at them, had barked the order in a distinct Russian accent.

'What's this all about?' demanded Sydney. 'We weren't breaking the law.'

'That is already done, is it not, Professor Fox?' As she spoke, the woman pulled an identity badge from her jacket. 'Larisa Kafelnikova, Russian Federal Security Service. You are being arrested under the Official Secrets Act regarding a theft which took place when you were in Russia two months ago.'

'What the heck?' Very cautiously, Sydney began walking down the steps towards the woman. 'I was in Moscow to give a paper on the lost truncheon of Genghis Khan, and the government reiterated their thanks to me for locating the Sword of Ateus by awarding me a medal!'

'Yes, and we have reasons to believe you abused that honour by stealing papers regarding the whereabouts of several invaluable relics!'

'I don't know what you're talking about!'

'Yes you do. At this very moment you have hidden about your person a picture of the last Russian Tsar, taken in front of a unique Egyptian obelisk; a photograph which is the property of the Russian government!'

'Uh, you can search me if you like, but I _don't _have any such photograph on me.' Sydney alighted on the ground in front of the agents as gracefully as she lied. 'But, of course, I'll be happy to help you with your investigation…'

She hadn't even finished the sentence when her high kick, blasting out of nowhere, sent the gun spinning off across the pavement.

'Oh God!' anguished Preston. Syd's follow-up blow sent the male agent sprawling into the railings at the bottom of the steps. 'You're going to get us killed!'

For a second it looked like he might be right. When Sydney turned to confront her, Larisa drew a gun from a holster concealed in her jacket, her finger poised on the trigger.

Bang!

Sydney's gasp caught like iron in her throat; Preston clutched his chest in horror. But it was Larisa Kafelnikova who slumped to the floor, a patch of scarlet spreading swiftly across her back.

'Ann-Marie!' yelled Sydney. 'NO!'

But she was too late. The MI6 agent had planted a second slug into the chest of the Russian man, even as he scrambled to his feet.

'You didn't have to do that!' thundered Sydney. 'You've probably killed them!'

'If I'd been two seconds later, you would've both been dead,' stated the willowy blonde. 'I've got a car at the end of the street. Are you coming?'

Sydney paused, glancing quickly down at the bodies. Right now, she trusted Ann-Marie less than ever. But what choice did she have?

'I have a lead on Nigel,' insisted Ann-Marie, gesturing urgently they should follow. 'Is _that _good enough for you?'

Sydney glowered darkly at the British spy. 'It'll have to be,' she thought to herself. 'Because the Russian government are _not_ going to be helping me now…'

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

CLANG!

'Aaaaaaargh!' Nigel woke up abruptly, nearly whacking his head on the roof of the shallow pipe.

'Ssssssssssh!'

Somehow, Derek made even this entreaty sound like a military command. Nigel crawled back around the corner, only for the US agent to shine a flashlight directly in his face.

'Ow!' Nigel shielded his eyes. 'What the hell are you doing?'

'Nothing. Did you sleep well?'

'No, it was lousy! And I'm guessing this is my wake-up call?'

'Yup.' Derek turned off the torch and skidded it up the pipe to Nigel, who felt it come to a rest against his knee. 'This is for you. But it's for when you reach Deviega's mess-room only. You can't use it in the pipe. It might shine through one of the grates into somebody else's cabin and then it's all over, my friend.'

'Okay,' sighed Nigel. 'Um, but why are _we _in total darkness?'

Derek was silent for a second. Nigel heard him scuffle, then turn on another torch.

'Better?'

'Uh, a bit,' replied Nigel uncertainly. He squinted back at Derek, desperately trying to read the agent's shaded expression. Suspicion kindled further when he glimpsed the outline of what looked like a large, square box on the bunk. He certainly hadn't noticed _that_ earlier.

'Why don't you, um, turn on the main-light? And what's that on the bed?'

'Nothing for _you _to worry about,' articulated Derek slowly.

Nigel could have screamed. He could put up with being cold, tired and hurt – but not with being patronized. 'Don't give me that! What is it? Come on, I've been doing your dirty work long enough – I have a right to know!'

'Don't give _me _that!' retaliated Derek, although his tone contained no real anger. 'All I've asked of you so far has been done in order keep _you _alive – and if you don't want to go after the Kremlin documents, then stay where you are. But _I _still have a mission.'

'Yes but what is that mission? Stop Deviega, find how the Needle words or…or…'

As visions of Derek blowing the relic to smithereens flashed into Nigel's mind, Derek suddenly stepped aside. He switched on the light to reveal a solid-looking metal box.

'It contains TNT,' he said plainly. 'Yeah, I want to know how this this thing works - but that's because my brief is to destroy it if it poses any significant threat to world security. I have spent the past few days assembling these resources from where they were hidden across the ship _just in case _that becomes a necessity. Is that good enough for you?'

'Uh…yes…I mean, well, no!' Nigel had hardly been prepared for such a disarming turn of honesty even though it was exactly as he'd suspected. 'I mean, it _is _a last resort, right? I've spend years of my life researching this thing and it's a unique historical artifact – I don't want it destroyed.'

'It's a last resort,' affirmed Derek, although Nigel noticed that, once again, his 'friend' was avoiding eye contact. 'So I can't trust Lloyd', he reminded himself. 'Nothing new there then…' The notion unsettled him, all the same.

Nigel heaved a heavy sigh. 'Okay. So how am I supposed to find my way?'

'Use your sense of direction. The mess room is on the floor above, behind the pilot's room. You have until zero-five-hundred-hours.'

'Marvelous,' grimaced Nigel. 'Well, I suppose I found my way back here before, but that was a combination of sheer luck and blind panic.'

'I wish you that luck now, buddy.'

'Thanks…um…' Nigel found himself involuntarily chewing his bottom lip. 'What do I do…if something does go wrong?'

'Same as before,' said Derek plainly. 'Make no attempt to contact me and don't compromise the mission. Now move!'

Nigel rolled his eyes - he was getting the gist of this only too well - and disappeared up again into the darkness of the pipe to execute his next mission.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

'There was absolutely no need to shoot them!' Sydney turned violently upon Ann-Marie as the car pulled away. 'I could have handled it.'

'I'm sorry!' Ann-Marie glanced nervously in the car mirror. 'But _I _couldn't take that risk.'

'No wonder diplomatic relations between Britain and Russia written an all-time low,' whined Preston from the back seat. 'What are we going to do now? I mean, surely they'll be after us, watching the airports and everything? Oh heavens, I'm going to wind up in a Russian jail!'

Sydney's attention, however, was entirely on Ann-Marie. Despite her sharp shooting, the woman still seemed far too jittery for an experienced agent. Nevertheless, there was only one thing she _really _wanted to know: 'You said you had a lead on Nigel. What is it?'

'Bellimo and Deviega left the Port of London yesterday on an empty carrier ship, _The Winter Queen_. We don't know for sure where it is heading, but the vessel is registered here, in St Petersburg, and there was no listed cargo – so, chances are, its sailing back to its homeport. The ship is on a satellite trace, and we'll be able to predict its destination better when it reaches the entrance to the Baltic Sea.'

Sydney struggled to maintain a calm façade at this news. The thought of poor Nigel – who got sea-sick at the best of times - stuck on a rusty cargo ship in the North Sea with only those fiends for company made her feel physically ill. Her voice cracked a little as she asked: 'Is there any way we can, uh, confirm its destination?'

'That's all British Intelligence were able to get their hands on,' sighed Ann-Marie. 'However, it does mean that your decision to follow Mr. Bailey here, rather than accompany me to Moscow may have been unexpectedly in our interests. In fact, it's a good job that I watched you rather more carefully than you watched me!'

Sydney glanced back at Preston, to see how he was digesting this new information. The elder Bailey was merely staring blankly out of the window. His look of panic returned, however, when Ann-Marie's tone suddenly sharpened: '_So_, Mr. Bailey, seeing as I'm sharing information here, I wondered if you would be so kind as to let me know why it is _you_ decided to come here? What have you been keeping from us?'

'Err…'

Sydney indicated with her eyebrows that Preston should proceed.

'Um, well, nothing important,' he began, sheepishly. 'I just found something in Nigel's papers that said that the obelisk may have been transported to St Petersburg at the end of 1915. That's all.'

'It seemed like the most solid lead we had,' admitted Sydney. 'I did try and tell you as soon as I knew, but you had already got on the flight to Moscow… or so I thought!'

'I appreciate that,' admitted Ann-Marie. 'Look, I know you don't quite trust me, Professor Fox, and I don't blame you after… after the mistakes surrounding Nigel's abduction, but we are going to have to all start working together if we go to find him alive.'

'Yeah, right,' replied Sydney, still not quite convinced. 'But next time we encounter trouble, let me handle it… at least, don't just shoot people with that stupid gun! I hate those things!'

Ann-Marie glanced down at the bulge in her jacket, where she had replaced the gun in its halter. 'All right. I'll hold back, but you have to trust my judgment too, Sydney. Sometimes, these _things _are necessary.' Turning onto a busy road out of the city, she braked suddenly then veered out around a single-decker white bus.

'This is all very well,' sighed Preston. 'But what do we do until we know where the boat is going? I mean, it's not like we can just book into the Astoria, is it?'

'No, we can't,' replied Ann-Marie. 'But I can take you to a safe house. And we need to keep after the Needle itself.'

'No,' replied Syd quickly. 'You can after the Needle if you want but, right now, Nigel is my priority. I'm going after the ship.'

'Oh, but on that ship they _do_ know where the Needle is!' insisted Ann-Marie. 'It's in those papers, and they have them. Go after the Needle, we find their destination, and we find Bellimo, Deviega and Nigel. In fact, for all we know, your assistant might have known the location all along. After all, he had that photograph that nearly got you in so much trouble!'

Both Sydney and Preston were silent, but they shared the same thoughts: 'How _did_ Nigel end up with a photograph that had been stolen from the Russian government – even before he was kidnapped?'

Sydney had no answer but, above all, she now knew she had to find out. Her gut told her that, somehow, that picture was the key.

**Thanks for reading. Please review.**


	11. Confusion

**Disclaimers: as ever. **

**Thanks for those reviews. Sorry I've been a while updating! Xmas busyness and expositions in other fandoms have not helped!! **

CHAPTER ELEVEN: CONFUSION

Nigel knew that the matter that the tunnel was sloping down was a bad thing. He was supposed to be going _up _to the next level - of that he was sure.

'Oh, damn! Please, please, please don't say I'm going to have to go all the way back to Derek's cabin and start again. I knew I should have gone left rather than right after the U-bend. I knew it!'

Nigel cursed again. His knees and elbows were sore from pushing himself forward, the flashlight in his pocket had been incessantly digging into his hip, and his fingers and chest were so cold they'd gone numb. There were other places where he'd lost feeling, too; places of which he was rather fond - and he dearly wished Sydney were around to massage the life back into them!

And, after an hour and a half, he found himself on the _lower _level of the boat. Peeping into another dim room, this one illuminated by a single light-bulb, he could see two large boilers, hissing and creaking as the boat rocked across the waves, and a plethora of dials and eighties-style digital displays. The cabin reeked of a sickly combination of petrol, curry and sweat.

'Great! I'm in the sodding engine room! Ugh, I am going to have to go all the way back again…'

However, as he dug his toes into the steel, about to drag himself backwards for the return voyage, something caught Nigel's eye.

'What the …?'

There, on the bench in front of one of the steaming boilers, lay a book. It was one of his: the text by Blundell Hughes on the decline of the use of Hieroglyphs in the years following Alexander the Great's invasion of Egypt, right through the reign of Cleopatra VII. He was incensed to see his lovely possession lying there, next to an empty beer can and a half-eaten plate of Chicken Tikka!

'I'm having that book back,' he muttered to himself indignantly. 'Hughes is one of the world's foremost experts – even if I have spotted a few mistakes – and I spent twenty-five pounds on it!'

With the help of his British Library Readers Ticket, Nigel had the grate off in a second.

The end of the tunnel was only about one metre from the floor, so he managed to land almost silently. His hand had nearly closed around his lovely book - when he heard a loud moan.

Nigel froze. He'd been so incensed at the treatment of his property that he hadn't noticed there was a second bench, in front an ancient looking switchboard against a near-wall. On it laid a rotund, sandy-haired man in oil-stained overalls. He had been asleep – but now he appeared to be stirring.

'Oh God,' thought Nigel. 'Derek's going to kill me…help, no he won't! _They'll _kill me first!'

Nigel grabbed the book and made a leap for the pipe.

'What? What! Jesus, Mary Mother of God!'

The engineer leapt up with a swiftness that belied his bulky form. He grabbed Nigel by the seat of his pants, even as he tried to scramble back into the pipe.

'No you don't, you little blighter!'

Struggling to find a foothold, Nigel turned and whacked the engineer on the side of the head with his beloved book. Although he was unable to get much momentum behind the blow, he was expecting it to at least have a _small _effect. Nevertheless, the engineer grinned broadly, and exclaimed in a broad, Irish accent:

'I knew you were feisty chaps, you leprechauns! I'm just glad I've finally got the chance to talk to one of you in person!'

Then he clapped Nigel on the shoulder, almost affectionately, pushed him back down onto the bench and sat down next to him, all the while beaming a ridiculous, toothless grin.

As Nigel stared back at him, more than slightly bewildered, he caught a whiff of vodka on the man's breath. He almost fainted with relief.

The engineer was absolutely plastered… which gave him the glimmer of a chance! Nigel's hopes - and disgust - surged to new heights, moreover, when the engineer grabbed his hand, leant in close and asked:

'So what's it like being a leprechaun that lives in the pipes of a ship?'

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Sydney paced impatiently around the cramped and spartan apartment, a 'safe-house' for MI6 agents in St Petersburg.

'If they shoot a couple of KGB agents dead every time they come here, no wonder they need somewhere to hide,' grumbled Preston, as soon as Ann-Marie left the room.

'Yeah, I'm not impressed,' admitted Sydney. 'And I'm not staying here for long. But where _did_ Nigel get that photograph from?'

She pulled the said photograph out of her satchel, and scrutinised it closely: 'You know, I think this picture was taken inside. It's quite dark, and the lights are shining like a spotlight on the Tsar, the little girl, and the Needle itself. If only we could see what was in the background!'

'I don't see what it can prove,' sniffed Preston. 'Apart from that the Needle was at the Palace in 1916 - but we already worked that out.'

Sydney ignored him. 'There's something else in this photograph, I can feel it.'

She flipped it over, and stared at the back of the photographic paper. It was stained with age, and there was a watermark in the corner - before, when she'd scrutinised it, she had assumed it was blank. Now, however, with a bright winter sun pouring through the window, she spotted something else.

'Look, beneath the watermark. There's a name!'

'Really? What is it?' She could feel Preston breathing heavily over her shoulder again as she held up the decaying paper to the sunlight.

'Anna Dostoyevsky,' they both said at once.

'Anna Dostoyevsky? Who the heck is that? The archaeologist's wife? His daughter? And…whoever, she is, why is her name written on the back of a picture of the Tsar?'

'I don't know,' admitted Sydney. 'Nigel would know…'

'Err, didn't you say that the papers that Nigel found at the British library were deposited by an Anna somebody?'

Sydney swivelled to face him so quickly that Preston took a shocked step back: 'Okay, you're on.' She pulled her cell-phone out of her pocket. 'I want you to call Daisy Peterssen at the British library and get out of her everything she knows about that file, and if she knows anything more about this Anna person...' She trailed off, her thoughts speaking louder than her words: 'Damn! Why didn't Nigel tell me about all of this? It so hard when we don't work together…'

Preston still looked alarmed. 'What if she won't tell me anything, we've already asked her to bend protocol… and what if the Russian Feds trace the call?'

'Come on, you can handle Daisy,' smirked Sydney. 'Invite her to dinner if you must… as for the Feds. Let me worry about that side of things.'

Preston nodded apprehensively, and started to dial.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

'It's just lovely being a leprechaun who lives in the pipes of the ship,' grinned Nigel, who was now starting to question if it was his own intoxication that had yet to wear off. 'But…uh, I'd better get back to the other leprechauns before they miss me. It's been a pl…'

'Not so fast, little leprechaun!' The engineer pressed his hand down on Nigel's knee as he tried to get up, and snatched away the book. 'I always knew that it was you little fellahs who kept on misplacing my things - and I am guessing it was you who threw the spanner in the works that stopped the heating functioning properly.'

'Um….no,' stuttered Nigel, leaning backwards even as the engineer edged forwards towards him. 'I swear I didn't break the heating! But I'm taking this book back because… because…well, because it's mine!'

'Yours, huh?' The engineer pulled a rubbery expression of surprise. 'I suppose it must be. To me, it looks like complete jabberwocky!' Nigel cringed as the engineer began to thumb through his precious belonging with oily, curry-stained hands. 'So is it written in leprechaun language?'

'Something like that,' breathed Nigel, ever so gently trying to pry the book away. 'But I'd _really_ like it back, please!'

Unfortunately, the engineer wasn't giving way easily, and hugged the book to his grubby-blue overalls. Nigel cursed him silently.

'Um, maybe we could do we deal?' he ventured. 'I'll ask all the other little leprechauns not to break the heating again, and you give me my book back and let me to return to pixie-land.' Nigel nearly added: 'or wherever it is you'd like to imagine that I've come from, you drunken oaf!' But he decided this would be imprudent.

The engineer scrunched a single eye, clearly putting great effort into mulling this suggestion over. Nigel waited with increasingly bated breath, wondering if he ought to cut his losses and make a dash for freedom. The lumbering fool might not catch him if he ran for it down the corridor…but he _did_ want his lovely book back!

'It's a deal,' he drawled at length, offering Nigel a meaty paw. As Nigel reluctantly took it, however, the engineer yanked him closes, leaning down confidentially so that their noses almost touched; Nigel began to feel sick again, and it was nothing to do with the bucking waves. Bad breath wasn't the word for it – this guy had full-on halitosis!

'It's a deal…but on one condition!'

'Err, what?' Nigel did his best to hold his breath.

'You're a good-looking young chap…'

Nigel's skin crawled with horror as he imagined what was about to be requested. He was going to _have_ to make a run for it!

'…and I expect you're a great hit with the lady leprechauns, fairies, whatever you call them, so I was wondering if you could give me a little bit of advice about the art of…um…wooing, I think you call it. Enticing those pretty ladies has never been my talent!'

'Ah!' Nigel let out a long, shuddering sigh of relief. 'Absolutely! It would be a pleasure!' Not that he felt like an expert at the art of love-making right now but this, at least, he could comfortably blag.

'Good, good. That's me, boy!'

His hand finally released, Nigel gave it a sharp shake and grabbed back his book. 'Um, what would you like to know about wooing the fairies…the ladies, I mean?'

'Well, I was looking in your little book, there. Interesting stuff – jabberwocky, but interesting stuff. And I found this symbol…'

To Nigel's surprise, the engineer pulled a loose piece of paper out of his book. He instantly recognised one of the rubbings from the Needle, covered with the 'love' symbols that he had mainly overlooked.

A greasy forefinger pointed to a symbol of a man and a woman, kneeling together. Their hands reached out, almost touching. The only thing between them was the representation of a bird. Nigel scrutinised the paper closely: he had not even got as far as analysing this page of glyphs and he never seen this symbol before, or anything quite like it. The bird resembled the vulture that usually represented death, but something about it was not quite right.

'Now isn't that beautiful?' sighed the engineer. 'Those two have got something going for them, haven't they?'

'I think maybe they have,' muttered Nigel, interested by the glyph, although still desperate to get away. 'So…um, the key to getting the ladies interested really is…is…'

He stalled: what in heaven's name was it?

'Um…' he cringed: 'Be yourself.'

The engineer nodded, his mouth hanging slightly open: 'Be myself!'

'It works with the lady leprechauns!'

Nigel jumped up, keeping a tight hold on both the book and the piece of paper. 'Now I really need to get back, otherwise I would be able to do anything about my, uh, leprechaun friends breaking all the boilers!'

'Ohhh…. right, you'd better skedaddle then.'

'Yes!'

Nigel had thrown himself into the pipe and was halfway to screwing the grate back on, when he heard his new 'friend' lie down and talking to himself.

'Be yourself, be yourself…my my, love is an enigma!'

'You're right there,' thought Nigel, 'maybe righter than I thought!'

Shuffling back up the pipe, he couldn't repress a tingling of excitement at the thought of the paper he'd tucked in the back of his waistband. Somehow he was now sure that the key to the Needle's secrets was not in the chronicles of war: they were hidden in the love poems.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

'So, what did you get?' demanded Sydney, as Preston placed down the phone looking particularly smug. 'Apart from a date!'

'We'd better be back in London next Wednesday or there is going to be one very disappointed librarian,' he drawled, smoothing his fingers over his hair. 'But, as for the papers…um, well, it's not exactly bad news. They were deposited by a lady called Anna Akunin - not much is known about her, apart from she had an address here in St Petersburg, on the Anglaskaya Parade…'

'… which makes it sound very much as if she _was _Boris Dostoyevsky's wife or daughter,' picked up Sydney. 'But that doesn't help us, because we've already visited that address and drawn a blank. We could break in, I guess…'

'No, no, no!' said Preston urgently. 'I don't think that would be necessary… you see, there's something else. I did ask…um, casually…about whether anything had gone missing from the folder…'

'You wanted to check if she'd noticed your little theft?' teased Syd.

'Um… not exactly, well, at least, not _only _that. But anyway, she said yes… apparently _two_ shipping orders for unidentified Egyptian obelisks had gone missing. Two!'

'Two? But you only took one...'

'Exactly! And what's more… so had a very valuable photograph of Nicolas II!'

'The Russian Tsar!' gasped Sydney.

'Exactly!' repeated Preston, obviously feeling particularly pleased with himself. 'So it looks like Nigel did steal the photograph. But not from the Russian government, from the British Library!'

Now even Sydney's head was beginning to hurt: 'So what were those two Russian agents on about then? Were they bluffing us?'

'I haven't got a clue,' sighed Preston. 'But…if Nigel _stole _the photograph, and I, uh, borrowed _one _of the shipping orders, who took the first one? Does Nigel have that too?'

'And what was the second obelisk?'

'Quite! Anyway, Daisy is just looking up who else has studied those folders lately, and could have stolen the items - of course, I convinced her that it couldn't possibly have been either Nigel or I! I'm going to contact her again in a few hours.'

Once again, Sydney was almost impressed: 'Good work, Preston. Although it still doesn't give us the breakthrough we need to find Nigel.'

She trailed off abruptly as loud footsteps came clattering up the stairs. Preston's eyes widened with fear, and even Sydney tensed. Nevertheless, a rhythmic knock on the door - the agreed safe sign - revealed it was Ann-Marie.

She started speaking before Sydney had the door more than an inch open: 'British Intelligence have had another trace on the ship, and its _not _heading up the Baltic – but around the coast of Norway!'

'Norway? That must mean its heading for…'

'My money is on the White Sea Ports - or Archangel. But we can't be sure – we should sit tight until we get a clearer idea of the destination.'

Sydney, however, had already flung her satchel over her shoulder.

'It's got to be a two days drive to that region – and I'm not waiting! Preston, are you coming?'

'Uh…okay.'

He shot an apologetic smile at Ann-Marie. She returned it and handed him his travel bag, before following him out of the door.

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

It took Nigel another hour of crawling around in the pipes to find Deviega's office – or, at least, to gaze out of a grate into a dark, empty space than he felt sure was the right place.

A thin pool of moonlight filtered through a porthole onto a table that very much resembled the one he had see earlier, covered in papers. Pulling the flashlight from his pocket for the first time, he ventured a little more light.

Nigel's heartbeat lurched as the yellow beams pierced the darkness – but the room was empty. He set to work unscrewing the grate.

Easing himself down from the exit from the ventilation shaft, however, his overwhelming sensation was of excitement. It felt like he was on a hunt again. It felt like Sydney ought to be right beside him…

Nigel tried not to let the thought of her absence dampen his spirits as he began to turn over the papers on the table. All the same, he was irritated to find that most of the rubbings he had so carefully started to sort through were now splayed carelessly between shipping documents and various other detritus. He knew he daren't tidy them again, but he did slip one or two sheets with the love-poem glyphs in his pocket.

'If they're as careless as they seem, they won't notice a few missing,' he told himself. 'Ow!'

His shin struck a large waste-paper bin, and he founding himself angrily pulling out another of his possessions: the ring-bound white notebook. 'How dare they!' He seethed. 'Well, seeing as they threw it away, they won't be missing it!'

Still furious, Nigel turned his attention to a pile of papers stacked under the trestle table. Half expecting to find more of his own misused things, he found himself reeling with shock to find himself holding a document signed by…

'Lenin! Vladimiir Lenin himself!'

Nigel flopped down onto a plastic chair in shock. This was a document signed by Lenin, in 1918, and it was about the transportation of Cleopatra's Needle!

'So it really did make it St. Petersburg,' he gasped. 'And it really must have been in possession of the Tsar – but what then?'

Concentrating very hard on translating the Russian quickly and correctly, Nigel began to read.

'Bloody hell,' he murmured after a moment. 'This is it. The Tsar must have had the Needle installed in the palace in St. Petersburg in 1916 – and the Bolsheviks took charge of it after the murders. But where did it go after that? And why was Lenin himself personally interested'

Nigel read on intently. The document contained only sparse details, but it specified that the Needle should be interred for analysis at the military installation of Severodvinsk in the region of Arkhangelsk Oblast in Northwestern Russia. 'That must be where we're going, then,' conjectured Nigel. Finding a stubby bit of pencil, he scratched down the long name on one of the rubbings he had already appropriated – just in case he forgot. 'Mind you, I'd be surprised if its still there…oh!'

Nigel squinted hard at the paper, confirming that his translation was right: 'Lenin himself wanted to know if there was any truth behind the rumour that the 'traitor to the Russian people', Rasputin, performed tricks with the obelisk including showering himself with flames! Now that _is_ interesting – Rasputin, mad monk, faith-heeler and alleged lover of the Russian queen, worked out how to use the Needle? Amazing…but I'd better put it back.'

Nigel replaced the transportation order, but it was the next document on the pile that really took his breath away. This one was a photograph, in faded sepia. It portrayed a man he instantly recognised as the Tsar, and beside him another beared man, dressed in the robes of a monk.

'Nicholas and Rasputin,' he gasped.

The background of the photograph was equally fascinating. The faded image portrayed a painted room filled with Egyptian artifacts: carved funerary jars, a bust of the Pharoah Nefertiti, and the outline of an obelisk that very much resembled one he'd seen in a photgraph before…

Nigel was still gawping, open-mouthed, at his confounding discovery when the clang of heavy foot-steps sounded suddenly from the corridor. Nigel stuffed the photograph in his pocket and slammed off the torch. It was all he could do to avoid kicking over the wastepaper bin as he fumbled his way across the darkened room and clambered back into the pipe.

**Thanks for reading. Please review :) I'll do my best to update this soon!**


	12. Theft

**Disclaimers: as ever.**

**Thanks for those reviews. **

CHAPTER 12: THEFT

'Does anybody have a map?' asked Preston wearily as they all piled back into Ann-Marie's car. 'I mean, my knowledge of Russian geography isn't perfect but I do know that its hundreds of miles from here to the White Sea.'

'We'll buy a map…somewhere,' started Sydney. 'But a car will be way too slow. Ann-Marie, do you know of anywhere where we could…uh, _borrow_ a plane?'

Ann-Marie shot her a thin smile. 'It's not going to be easy, especially after you forced me to shoot two Russian agents.'

Was that a joke? Syd's eyes thinned suspiciously: 'I hardly forced you to!'

'Um, well…' Ann-Marie flustered nervously, tugging a strand of flyaway hair and apparently regretting her words. 'Actually, with a bit of cash we still might find somebody willing to give us a ride.' She turned the keys in the ignition. 'There's a little-used wartime airstrip to the north of the city. Let's give it a try.'

'Fine,' said Sydney, but she could still barely contain her impatience. Ann-Marie's pace was way too leisurely for her liking: 'Come on…go, go, go!'

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Nigel heard the soft grunt of snoring as he rounded the u-bend in the ventilation pipe approaching Derek's cabin.

'I see that _somebody_ has a chance to sleep,' he grumbled. The light was off too, so it was very dark. He could feel a gentle heat wafting from the convector heater, though. 'Nice for some,' he grumbled again. 'Arrrgh!'

Nigel knocked his head on the top of the pipe with a clang, as Derek's deadly serious face loomed up suddenly on the other side of the gauze. 'Jesus, Derek! You startled me! I thought you were asleep!'

'Not for one second you were away, my friend. And will you please keep the noise down?'

Nigel bristled indignantly. 'Will _you_ please not creep up on me in the dark like that again…um, and are you going to let me out or do I have to screw this one off myself too?'

'Do you need the bathroom?'

'I wouldn't mind, if it's not a _terrible_ bother!' Nigel hoped that Derek was suitably soaked by his dripping sarcasm – but he wasn't sure.

'Alright then, you can come in, but just for five minutes.' He began unfastening the grate. 'So…did you get the information?'

Nigel laughed dryly. 'I thought you were never going to ask. Yes, well – I got something, alright!' Nigel quickly summarised what he had read in the papers, about how Lenin had ordered the Needle to be investigated at a military installation at Severodvinsk in the region of Arkhangelsk Oblast, and that Rasputin might - just might - have got the Needle working in some form before that.

'Rasputin?' queried Derek.

'Yeah, you know: 'The Tsarist politician, faith healer, mad monk, beardy chap…or, as he is better known today: 'Ra-Ra-Rasputin, lover of the Russian Queen!''

'I know who Rasputin is!' replied Derek, deadpan.

'Okay, just checking!' Secretly, Nigel had been dying to sing that for some time. 'Anyway, I, um, managed to get a few things back, too.'

'What?'

Nigel had now clambered down so he could stretch out his aching limbs. The sudden anger in Derek's expression, nevertheless, caused him to sidle back against the wall.

'It's only a few pages of the hieroglyphs, honest – the love poetry. Deviega thinks they are useless, but I'm increasingly convinced that is where we should be looking…'

'And a book! Jesus, Nigel, have you any idea what you're messing with?'

Nigel winced crossly as Derek grabbed him by and arm and span him around so he could yank the volume on hieroglyphs from where it nestled in the back of his trousers. 'You shouldn't have done that! We can't afford to leave any clue that you're still alive - or that there could be a saboteur. They will suspect _me_!'

'But I thought you wanted me to translate these bloody things?'

'While they were in our hands, yes, but not at such a potential cost. This could render us both dead men!'

Nigel 'humphed' noisily and slumped down on edge of the bunk, resolving to keep quiet about the photograph he'd taken for now. 'They won't miss them! Some stupid, drunken engineer had the book in the boiler room! If I hadn't taken it when I did, it would have had curry sauce all over it and been completely ruined! And…well…it _was _mine…and besides…I found out why it's so cold on this ship. Apparently, somebody tampered with the heating system!'

This nugget of information was more successful than he even hoped: Derek burst into laughter.

'Yeah, _I_ sabotaged it. Remember what I said about those fumes? This ship is old and falling apart. If they were on, the fumes in the ventilation pipes on those lower levels would be dangerous – and if things get _really_ dangerous, you might have to hide there.'

'Oh, lucky me!'

'Yeah, lucky you! Now get back in there!'

Nigel groaned, and stretched himself out on the bunk behind him – before he know it, he found he was pouting slightly, peeping up at Derek from under a lock of damp hair. 'But I want to get into your bed!'

Derek raised a pair of quizzical eyebrows: 'You've changed your tune, Bailey!'

'Yeah, well, sometimes a guy gets desperate…okay…okay…I'm going!' Nigel labouriously levered himself up onto his elbows. 'You at least said I could borrow your bathroom!'

'Yeah, so do it. Quickly!'

When Nigel re-emerged, Derek was already looking impatiently at his watch. 'Okay, so now we have an objective – we get to that military installation before Deviega, whatever the cost! I'll be back in one hour. And when I return I do not want to see you here!'

'Yes, yes, whatever!' Nigel yawned widely, but Derek reached to pull him back towards the pipes.

Nigel still grumbling, resisted the assistance, and began clambering back in of his own accord. 'God, its cold - and I can't believe _you_ broke the heating! At least I now know who the _real_ leprechaun in the ventilation system is!'

But Derek didn't hear. He had already, silently, slipped away

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Ann-Marie drove to the quiet air-strip to the north-east of the city without any need for a map, and then pulled up by a shabby-looking watch-tower topped with a saggy windsock.

'Wait one minute,' she smiled, and leapt out. 'I'll see what I can do!'

Sydney was out of the car almost simultaneously. 'Shall I come too?'

'No, let me sound this out. It could be that the Feds are watching the airstrips. But don't worry, I know what I'm looking for.'

'I don't like this,' muttered Syd, climbing back into the car. 'For an agent apparently un-used to overseas travel, Ann-Marie has an awful lot of contacts around here.'

'Did Karen turn up anything on her?'

'Only the same as you – she does a desk-job in London.'

'Perhaps she's _so_ top-notch, the desk job is a cover?'

'Maybe…but, if so, why does she strike me as slightly inept?'

Preston shrugged. 'Apart from the whole getting Nigel kidnapped cock-up, she seems quite nice to me. Oh, and I suppose the shooting thing was a bit of a blot, but she did save us from being arrested. I shudder to think what the jails are like around here.'

'Yeah, well – I _still_ don't trust her. By the way, did you manage to get your hands on map?'

'Err, yes.' Preston cringed. 'But I don't think the woman I asked in the shop spoke very good Russian.'

'Didn't speak very good _Russian_? Preston, she _was _Russian! Unlike you…what did she give you?'

'Um…this.' Preston handed her a dog-eared road map of the north-west of the Soviet Union, which looked like it dated from the 1950's.

Sydney rolled her eyes: 'Preston, were you in a book shop or an antique shop?'

'It sold books!' he protested. 'Well, they might have been second-hand ones, but how was I supposed to tell? Anyway, this was the only one which had most of the names in England and Russian…and it really is a stupid language. I have every appreciation for cultural difference, but surely they should have worked out that its best to use good, plain English letters!'

Sydney raised her hands in despair and, turning her attention back to the matter in hand, Sydney scanned her eyes over the airstrip. There were a couple of light aircraft docked a little way off, and in the distance was a tumble-down aircraft hanger. Alarm bells rang, however, as she caught sight of a shiny, black Scoda saloon, parked on the far-side of the runway. Even as her apprehension grew, a distant rumbling turned into the distinct sound of a helicopter whirring overhead. Then the headlights of the car flashed on; its engine was starting.

'What…what's that noise?' stuttered Preston.

'It's the Feds! They were waiting for us!'

Sydney reached across to start the car, but Ann-Marie had taken the keys. 'Damn!'

It was a modern Renault, and would be impossible to hotwire in a hurry. The Scoda was already speeding in their direction, and she could hear the chopper was coming down nearby.

'We're going to have to make a run for it!' she yelled.

'But…but…they'll gun us down!'

'Not if you stay close!'

Preston yanked his fingers through his hair in anguish: 'But where are we going?'

'First we dash to behind the watch-tower; second we get to that little plane! Now go!!!'

Sydney was relieved when she got to the shelter of the watchtower to find that Preston was still with her. But the helicopter had now landed, and she could here the squeal of the Scoda's breaks. Any second it would be level with them. She grabbed his arm and made the dash for the plane.

Gunfire sprayed from the landed chopper as they tore across the runway.

'Aaaaargh!'

'Preston, have you been hit?'

'Not yet…but it's only a matter of time surely!'

The both bundled into the aged plane.

Preston was panting heavily, his hand on his chest. 'Oh my God, we're going to die…we're going to die…'

'No we're not!'

Sydney swiftly pulled a cable from her satchel and jammed it in the ignition. 'Now this I can hotwire! Yes!'

The engine gave a cough, a splutter and then exploded into life.

'Great!' squeaked Preston, observing with panic as Sydney hastily fiddled with numerous switches, levers and dials. 'But can you fly the bloody thing?'

'That's what we're about to find out!'

'Aaaargh!'

Things were getting urgent. The Scoda drew up next to them, machine-guns protruding from the partially blacked-out windows, at the same second the plane began to slowly jutter forward. Preston ducked down as the bullets began to whiz through the air, zinging off the reinforced glass and metallic body-work of the plane.

'Put your foot on it!!' he screamed.

'What do you think I'm doing?'

Sydney took a deep breath, and calmly tried to remember everything she had learnt in her flying lessons, ten years ago. Sure, she'd drawn on her pilots skills a few times in hunts since, but she'd never quite found time for that refresher course she'd promised herself - or actually got around to qualifying for her licence.

'Not to self: take more lessons, Sydney,' she muttered. 'But here goes nothing…'

Bullets clattered off the back of the little aircraft as it accelerated over the runway. The car couldn't level with her now, but she could hear the chopper in the background, powering up again. That would certainly catch her, if she didn't get in the air!

Preston, his head buried in his lap, was mumbling incoherently to himself; she betted he was praying. 'You'd better put your seatbelt on!' she grinned, 'this could be a bit bumpy ride!'

Preston didn't stir, but a wide grin spread over Sydney' face as the rough drive over the runway came to an abrupt end, substituted by an altogether smoother, if not entirely level ride. There was not ground beneath them now. Only air.

'Yes!' She breathed a huge sigh of relief, as she saw the end of the runway flash into green trees, which themselves were already looking as small as bonsais. The gun-fire couldn't reach them now – and, as long as she kept the pace up, she knew the chopper would never be able to catch the little jet.

Preston peeped up from his knees, his face white as a sheet. 'We didn't…we didn't…'

'Yeah, we made it,' grinned Sydney.

'Oh!' Preston flopped backwards in the co-pilots seat, 'Sydney…obviously, I had every faith in you…but…but…' He shot her a peevish grin. 'That was close!'

Sydney laughed out loud: 'Yes, it was close; but I appreciate you, uh, trusted me!'

'Oh…absolutely, absolutely! Every time!'

Preston laughed with her – and Syd suddenly she felt very odd. Being with Preston was, in some ways, very like being with Nigel. He was sharp and clever – not nearly as clever as his brother, but far from stupid – he had a decent sense of humour, and now it seemed that, in his own way, he was starting to trust her implicitly.

But she didn't trust him; and she didn't love him either. Preston was not Nigel, and he never would be.

She had to blink hard to pull her concentration back. 'Altitude is fine,' she stated, running her eyes over the various displays on the dashboard. 'Speed good…fuel…hmmm, only half a tank. I wonder how far that will get us?'

'We're going to have to come down before somebody detects us on the radar anyway!'

Even Sydney jumped at the woman's voice. Preston barely repressed a squeal and thought for a moment he was going to have a heart-attack. It was Ann-Marie.

'How…what…how the heck did you get here?'

Sydney glanced over her shoulder in surprise at the woman who now peeping between the two pilots seats from a murky hold area.

Ann-Marie cringed. 'I sort of hid…I was plotting a way to get you two out of there, and then you came to me!'

Sydney curled her lip in disbelief. 'Why didn't you say anything until now?'

'I didn't want to distract you! Besides, I was impressed. You're very good at your job, Professor Fox!'

'And you're the worst agent I've ever met,' retaliated Sydney. 'I thought you'd set us up!'

'I told you it was a risk going to an airstrip. But I would have got you out of there…somehow!'

'Yeah, right!' Sydney rolled her eyes, and turned her attention back to her piloting as they hit the first patch of thin cloud. 'Archangel Oblast, here we come!'

**Thanks for reading. Sorry that was a short one, but there will be more soon. Please review.**


	13. Closer

**Disclaimers: as ever.**

**Thanks for those reviews. Sorry about the lack of updates on this. I promise I'll start updating more regularly again so I can finally get Sydney and Nigel into the same scene!!**

**Oh, and for those of you waiting for the next chapter of Resolution, I'm working on it! I'll try get something up over the next day or so.**

Chapter 13: Closer

'Okay, so which way do we head?' asked Sydney, still fiddling with the numerous switches and buttons on the planes dashboard. She didn't have a clue what most of them did!

'Um…hard to tell,' said Preston, who was still rather flustered. 'Can you see a lake anywhere? We need to head for Lake Lagoda then keep straight on. That's the way to Archangel…sort of!'

Sydney squinted her eyes and scanned the vast country beneath them. They were reaching several thousand feet now and beneath them all she could see was lush, pine forest. In the distance to the east, however, she made out the shimmering surface of a lake. 'I think I've got it…'

'This is no good!' interjected Ann-Marie. 'What we need is another airstrip, somewhere to come down before the Russians pick us off like a sitting duck!'

'We ought to be safe above the lake,' pointed out Sydney.

Preston, however, had gone as white as a sheet: 'What if they scramble a jet fighter? They'll shoot us down in this thing in no time!'

Sydney smirked and, to her relief, Ann-Marie laughed too. 'I doubt even _you're _quite important enough for that honour! The lake looks amazing, though – wow!'

They all gazed momentarily towards Lake Lagoda as they zoomed closer; a dark, azure blue, it sparkled under the bright, late autumn sun, its edges laced with archipelagos of little, green islands. Other than that, the water stretched hazily towards the curving horizon of the earth.

'It's around one hundred kilometres across, I believe' said Ann-Marie, leaning over Preston's shoulder to read the map. 'We need to find somewhere to come down as soon as we hit the other side, though, not least because the fuel is dropping fast.'

She pointed to the tank: from being around half-full at take-off, the indicator was now suggesting it had little more than a third.

'I'm sure we'll make it to the far side of the lake,' stated Sydney. 'Preston, can you for somewhere to land over there?'

Preston rustled the map noisily as he turned it over. 'Ah…here we are. Hmmm, its mainly forest and blank looking tundra…ah, look, there's a place, Petrozadvodsk.'

'Petrozavodsk must have an airport,' said Sydney. 'It's the capital of the republic of Karelia, and a beautiful city. I dropped by on a hunt once.'

'It certainly does have an airport,' said Ann-Marie, 'but we can't risk coming down anywhere so public! Besides, I don't think we'll make it that far!'

Sydney glanced again at the fuel gage: 'I hate to say it, but you're probably right. Is there anything else?'

'There's another airstrip a few miles from the north-west corner of the Lake at…oh God, I can't read the bloody names when they're only in Russian…but, anyway, its there and its not far from the main M18 road, that goes, well, roughly in the right direction! But…um, whatever it was called, the name is crossed out, which suggests it was disused when this map was made a good few decades back.'

'Oh. Is there nothing else?' asked Sydney.

'No!'

'Well, that's where we're going then. What should my bearings be?'

'Uh, straight on, well north-east …I think…but it's a bit of a risk. What if the runway isn't there any more?'

'Do you have a plan B?'

'Err, once again – no!'

'Fine,' said Sydney. 'Then the runway will have to still be there. Archangel here we come… let's just hope I can work out how to land this thing!'

Ann-Marie and Preston exchanged horrified looks: 'what?!'

'Uh, you know the story - I learned to _fly_, yes. Land…uh, no!

'Oh yes, I know the story,' wailed Preston. 'Indiana Jonescould fly and not bloody land!'

'Well, what are you worrying about, then? Indy landed the plane okay in Last Crusade, didn't he?'

'NO!' shouted her two passengers, once again in tandem.

'If memory serves,' groaned Preston. 'Indiana Jones crashed the plane!'

'Actually, I seem to recall he was shot down,' grinned Sydney. 'And there's nobody shooting at us…yet! Anyway, I have landed a plane before…well, I've crashed twice, once in Nova Scotia, which ended up being rather fortuitous for the Sister of Mercy, and once in Mexico when I was with Dallas…' She couldn't repress a smirk at the circumstances of the Mexican crash: she had been a lot younger then, and had been rather easily 'distracted'.

'I have landed once,' she concluded. 'Well, sort of…using a stimulator.' Having finished setting the navigation, she lent back in her seat and stretched out her arms, even as her two passengers regarded her with horror. 'So relax, guys! Everything will be just fine!'

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

'Will you go make yourself invisible?'

Derek slammed the door shut behind him as hard as he dared and glared at Nigel. His friend was snuggled in the bunk, glasses propped on the end of his nose, and studying the increasingly numerous sheets of paper he had been snaffling from Deviega's office, and which he had propped up on his knees.

'No,' retaliated Nigel grumpily. 'I'm sick of squeezing myself into freezing cold pipes and squinting to read by torchlight. I swear, over the past couple of days I've had cramp in muscles I never knew existed. And, as far as I can see, nobody has ever come in here, so what's the problem?' His focus returned to the fascinating papers in front of him.

'The problem,' stated Derek, grabbing away the papers so suddenly that Nigel jumped, 'is still you! This place is getting more dangerous by the minute. We're going to be in port in one day and, for the first time, I just risked using the radio to send a message.'

'Who to?' asked Nigel, snatching the papers back.

'To Sydney Fox.'

'Sydney?' Even for Nigel, the papers suddenly lost their interest. 'Seriously? What did you tell her? Did she say anything…about…um, me?'

'I didn't speak to her direct,' said Derek, yanking off his sweater and T-shirt – Nigel cringed and averted his eyes from the other mans' impressive physique - and then pulling on a sleeveless muscle-vest. 'I sent a message via an Interpol code to get word to her by any means instructing her to rendezvous with us at the military installation in Severodvinsk, in approximately thirty-six hours. I thought her expertise might be invaluable in the last stages of recovery.'

Nigel nodded, still digesting the information. 'And does that, uh, mean that you're not going to blow the Needle up?'

'That is still to be determined.'

'Oh.' Nigel wanted to argue, but he now overcome by very mixed feelings. He wanted nothing more than to see Sydney again – but what would she say? Was she still angry? What's more, while half of him lauded the plan, he also experienced a significant pang of resentment that Derek saw Sydney's presence as necessary. So, after everything, his 'buddy' still thought he was inadequate to even the task of relic hunting without his beautiful boss.

But then, he was, wasn't he? They were a team…

'I thought you'd be pleased.' Derek pulled a thick wool sweater over the vest. He liked the bare-shouldered 'look' but it was just too darn cold to pull it off right now! The temperatures on the boat had dropped to below freezing as they rounded the northern coast of Scandinavia, nearing the mouth of the White Sea. The boat's navigators had to keep constant watch for ice-flows – a scary thought given most of the crews' apparent incompetence. He glanced over at Nigel, noting that he had wrapped himself in every blanket in the cabin – and few that he feared came from somebody else's. He still looked pale and he could somehow sense his friend's teeth were chattering. Nigel was staring, his eyes increasingly misted, at the papers raised on his lap.

'Well, aren't you pleased?'

'Of course I am…its just…just…'

'You're apprehensive about seeing her because you argued.'

'No.' Nigel took a deep breath. 'Sort of….oh, who am I trying to fool. Yes, we argued…but not before, not before…'

'Not before you'd 'had' her?'

Nigel scrunched his nose in disgust. 'Don't be so crude!'

'I'm only quoting your good self!'

The American was now in the bathroom, and Nigel couldn't help peeping nosily to see what he was doing. Derek Lloyd was regarding himself intently in the mirror, and reaching for a tube of hair-gel.

Still, the last comment riled him: 'You said you'd never mention that again!'

'I'm not talking about that…I'm talking about you and Sydney. What happened, my friend? I thought you'd know her well enough to enjoy it while it lasted in the knowledge that she'd always move on. Sydney Fox is not a one-guy woman.'

'You…you're wrong…she just, just…'

'…hasn't found the right man yet?' Derek laughed softly to himself. 'Didn't she think she'd found Mr. Right in that moron Greg, or whatever he was called.'

'Grey,' said Nigel softly. 'He was called Grey, and she never loved him, or he her. She thought she did but she said…she said…'

Derek emerged back in the room, his wavy hair neatly coiffed, a towel around his shoulder. 'She said what?'

'She said she loved _me_, Derek…that I was her best friend, and…and when I said I loved her she said I made her happier that she ever deserved to be…' Nigel drew one hand wearily across his forehead. 'Then we were so happy for, oh, about a fortnight…and then we got back to Trinity'

'Phew!' Derek puffed out his cheeks in surprise. 'I had no idea it got that serious…what happened?'

'Its too depressing to even think about!'

'Everything went back to normal, I guess? She kept things quiet, started playing the field again?'

'No!' replied Nigel adamantly. 'Well…and yes. Sydney wouldn't tell a soul about us, not even Karen, even though she suspected something was amiss. She said she wasn't ready and, though she flirted a bit and I got impatient with the secrecy – I wanted to tell the world I loved her – but I wasn't really worried. Then…bloody Grey turned up again. It was obvious from the start it was a ruse to win her back. He brought a cryptic map showing the whereabouts of an ancient Caribbean burial urn - and he knew she'd bite. So off we all went to the Dominican Republic, her swearing blind she wouldn't take the bait…and…and…'

'…they slept together?'

'Nnnng! Oh I don't know!' Derek was a little taken aback by Nigel's cry of despair, and disturbed by its volume. He raised a finger to his lips, and Nigel's tones fell hushed as he continued.

'I was just so jealous that when they went off to get the urn alone, and came back laughing and flirting that I assumed they did. Well, they probably did, didn't they?'

Derek blinked at Nigel, almost disbelieving – that was a genuine question. 'Don't know, buddy, not my 'need to know'!'

'Don't joke. _I _needed to know. I lost my temper and Sydney went off the wall! She wouldn't tell me either way…so the moment we got back to Trinity, I booked myself on a flight to London.'

'I see,' said Derek. 'And do you still think she slept with him?'

Nigel moaned again, squeezing his eyes tight shut. 'I don't know…in a way, I don't care! I just want things to be like the way they were, before I went and spoilt everything! She always flirted with tons of men, and I went along with it…hell, I've flirted with enough pretty blondes on our hunts! What right did I have to think that I could keep her all to myself?'

'That's a very noble attitude,' conceded Derek. 'Unnecessarily so, I think.'

Nigel barely heard him. 'What right had I to tie her down, to claim her…I just…just…want to be with her, take care of her…she does need somebody to take her of her, Derek…honestly, she does!'

'Yeah, and you always did a great job!' Derek patted Nigel reassuringly on the shoulder. 'And I hate to be the one playing agony aunt, but you guys need to talk.'

'I know,' muttered Nigel wanly. 'But what if she doesn't want me back…I don't know what I'd do…in London, even with my research, life was just so…so…empty…'

'She will! Heck, I'm willing to postpone finding the Needle for the matter of minutes it is going to take you guys to sort everything out!'

'It might take more than that…oh, Derek! I'm just so bloody miserable! What am I going to do with my life without her?'

'Hey!' Derek leant down, this time placing both hands on Nigel's shoulders, looking at him straight-on with his twinkling blue-eyes. 'What about you? What about Nigel Bailey, the brilliant young scholar, the lady-killer?' He couldn't resist a wink. 'My money's on betting she can't let her best assistant go. But there's _plenty_ you can do without her; plenty of other people who'd want to spend a lot of time with you.'

'I don't know…' Nigel shuffled self-consciously, and Derek drew away. 'I don't think I can ever make her really happy…'

'You already do! And as for her sleeping with Grey, well she might have done…but getting into Sydney Fox's underwear is not as easy as you might think.'

'I never said it was!' interrupted Nigel, instinctively incensed.

'You sure as heck implied it was, for the right sort of guy. Well, it isn't! After we got back from New Guinea I tried – boy, how I tried! Music, dancing, candlelight, food and wine…and all I got at the end was a chaste thank you kiss on the cheek and an 'it's been pleasant, Derek Lloyd'. She isn't easy, Nigel! You did well!'

'I'm not sure if I should take that as a complement or not,' said Nigel carefully.

'You should!' Derek flashed a toothy grin. 'I'm guessing, despite that calm, collected facade, she's beating herself up every bit as much as you are over this. After all, if truth be known, she can't live without you either, however much she fools herself. The only question is…'

'Yeah, I know, friends or lovers?'

'Same difference. The real question is whether this takes you one or two minutes to sort this out after the second we rendezvous. I'm hoping for the former, because time is short! Talking of which…' Derek paused and picked up the papers Nigel had been studying. 'Any luck?'

'Um, maybe,' said Nigel, quietly relieved to have changed the subject. 'Lots of love poetry, and it's pretty explosive!'

'Sounds like what we're looking for?'

'I don't know. I can't quite decipher all of it because the rubbings are so poor, but listen to this bit…'

_Thus by your belief I have changed stone to fire  
And my heart shall lay waste  
to all that would divide us, _

_When dust pierces stone and thus __I call__:  
"Anhur's weapon will be my salvation, _

_For I seek you with longing, __And without you I am as one dwelling in a tomb._

Derek listened intently as Nigel read, and then frowned perplexedly: 'Changed stone to fire? Dust pierces stone? Is that the formula - what kind of dust?'

'Well, I don't know yet…but it might be here somewhere. Anhur is the Egyptian God of War, though, so I'm sure this is a breakthrough…'

'Might just be quasi-religious mumbo jumbo then,' snorted Derek. 'Is there nothing else?'

Nigel ruffled his fingers through his hair in frustration. Sydney would never be so dismissive of even the tiniest clue, let alone such a fascinating one! 'There is one other thing,' he continued, his enthusiasm only slightly diminished. 'I've just found a passage in Ancient Greek. I have had time to read it all yet but it seems mighty odd!'

'Ancient Greek? Why would there be Ancient Greek on an Egyptian artefact?'

'Well, Cleopatra was descended from a Greek dynasty, that of Ptolemy, one of the Generals who received the Egyptian portions of Alexander the Great's Empire after his death. By the famous Queen's reign, glyphs were only used for ceremonial purposes; Greek was used for business…which might mean…'

'…this is the passage you've been looking for.' completed Derek.

'Well, um, possibly…'

Derek, however, was now glancing down at his watch, and scarcely noticed Nigel's uncertain tone. 'Good work,' he barked. 'Keep it up, but don't you dare steal any more papers. I have somewhere to be, so I'll see you in approximately one hour.' He suddenly grabbed Nigel's arm again, not in the slightest bit gently this time, and dragged him out of the bunk. 'And for Christ's sake get back into that pipe before I have to seal you in there!'

'Like I said before – you're a bloody slave driver,' grumbled Nigel, but did what he was asked, all the same.

**Thanks for reading. Please review. Yeah, and I promise to get the plot cracking on in the next chapter. **


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